


Tall Tales

by mandrakefunnyjuice



Category: Tales of Symphonia
Genre: Action, Angels, Betrayal, Gen, Humor, Magic, Merciless mockery, Parody, Raging insanity, Science, Skirt-wearing men, Sociopathy, capes, woe
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-10-28
Updated: 2012-11-21
Packaged: 2017-11-17 04:36:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 55,574
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/547685
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mandrakefunnyjuice/pseuds/mandrakefunnyjuice
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A story of woe, betrayal, art, vice, mystery, action, love, hate, science, magic, fashion, friendship, adventure, angels, capes, skirt-wearing men, and the merciless mockery of all of the above.</p><p>Rated for language and abusive Professors.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Scene 1: A Pitiful Schoolhouse

**Author's Note:**

> This story is also on FF.Net. Disclaimer: I don't own these characters but I reserve the right to satirize the living shit out of them.
> 
> There is a surprise image at the end. Why? Because Paint may be lame, but it is our friend, and it deserves love.
> 
> Remember: read, enjoy, and review, hopefully in that order.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The camera descends on the tiny, pitiful village of Iselia, wherein our intrepid heroes are introduced and proceed to embark on their epic quest.

SCENE 1:  A PITIFUL SCHOOLHOUSE

In a magical land of wonder called Symphonia, full of bunnies, plot, and state-of-the-art graphics (and the retarded, low-income, orgiastic offspring of that mediocre ménage a troi), sat a small and pitiful little schoolhouse made of cardboard and nails. In it sat a pitiful nerd, his pitiful class, and his two pitiful idiot friends that repeatedly copied off of his pitiful homework and cheated him out of his lunch money. To make matters worse, his evil older sister was the teacher of the class.

Drooling and sleeping in the very back of the grungy one-room schoolhouse with two buckets in each hand stood a drooling idiot, which in hindsight is redundant and probably some type of fallacy, as all idiots drool at some point or another. This drooling idiot's name was Lloyd Irving, and he was wearing a bright red buttoned get-up with suspenders, the effect of which made Joan Rivers' plastic face cry crocodile tears in agony whenever anyone glimpsed at it, and also insert overused joke about Baby Jesus here. The two buckets that Lloyd was holding were filled with grade-A Dasani water, because the water that came from the well in the back of the little schoolhouse was full of iron and was too grungy and pitiful to drink or one might die of salmonella.

But such things were far from Lloyd's sleeping, comatose mind.

Two rows from the back and three seats to the right sat an adorable little cerulean-eyed blond idiot named Colette Brunel whom, while having no chest to speak of, was simply too adorable for words. She had two middle names – Mary and Sue. And she was the Chosen One, who was supposed to save the world. She admired/had the hots for the idiot Lloyd intensely, which the elven nerd Genis could not fathom, because he was not gay and had no muscly muscles, unlike Lloyd.

Genis, the nerdy elf, sat right next to Colette and had been asking for a seat change from his evil sister for years. He wanted to be as far away from these idiots in his class as possible as he was paranoid that their idiocy was actually toxic and transmittable by air, like tuberculosis. And like tuberculosis, laughing about the predicament only made it worse.

While all this descriptive, impressive stuff was happening, Genis's evil elven sister was lecturing the class about something or other. It was really boring. Not even Genis was paying attention.

"Does anyone know the answer?" Evilly said the evil teacher, Genis' evil elder sister, Raine. She rubbed her pale hands together in a gesture of evil that would've made Monty Burns proud.

Genis prayed to all the Gods he knew of that his evil sister wouldn't point her evil index finger at him.

But, because God hates him, she did.

Genis decided that Richard Dawkins had the right idea from then on.

Standing up and giving a sarcastic salute to his sister, he answered faithfully, "Raine, even if I was listening, I wouldn't give you the satisfaction of an answer." He knew that this reply would spell his doom, but in his elven little nerdy, god-complex mind, he thought that it would be worth it.

Raine's response was an enraged scream and desk-throw at Genis' pitiful elven head. He was knocked out instantly, because he had no dodging skills to speak of, and the resultant loud bang of desk-against-flesh woke Lloyd up from his stupor.

"What? Whu—What happened? Aww, man, I was having the most awesome dream, too."

Raine screamed fitfully and, foaming at the mouth, picked up the nearest object, which happened to be a small child and threw it at Lloyd's idiot head. Lloyd, who possessed a much higher ability to dodge flying desks and children than Genis, easily dodged the shrieking projectile that then went crashing out of the cardboard window and likely fell to his death. But because everyone in this village that the schoolhouse was a part of was a complete sociopath, no one gave a damn, least of all Lloyd.

Colette, however, was a nasty little do-gooder Chosen One and had something nosy to say about all of Raine's violence.

"Ms. Sage, like, why are you throwing kids? That's mean! The Goddess Martel wouldn't approve."

Raine was too busy screaming in rage and threw another child at Lloyd. Completely rabid at this point, she tore off her orange teacher-robe and jumped through the ceiling of the schoolhouse and went to spread her rabid psychosis towards all the other people in the village.

Genis chose that exact moment to wake up from his concussion. "Owww….my head!"

"Dude," Lloyd laughed, dropping the buckets of water he'd been holding, "Genis, you should've seen your sister, that was freaking epic. Hey, why were you on the floor, anyway?"

"Oh Goddess…" Genis muttered, and then corrected himself (as he'd chosen to be an atheist a few paragraphs up), "ugh, I mean, oh Math and Darwin…what happened?"

Colette cocked her chosen head to the side and stared up at the new hole in the ceiling. "I wonder how she did that…?"

Genis stared at the new hole that Raine had made in the schoolhouse's cardboard ceiling and groaned in despair. "Oh, Go—I mean, Science, _another_ hole? Now the owls are going to get in again…they'll make such a mess…"

"God, stop whining," Lloyd guffawed and smacked Genis in the back of his atheist head. Genis was knocked out cold, as Lloyd was unaware of his strength (he had also forgotten to take his Exsphere off that morning, a blue-shaped gem embedded on his left hand in the shape of a donut hole which was poorly concealed by a Scooby-Doo Band-Aid, and it also enhanced his strength tremendously with _maaaagic_ ) and the small genius slid to the ground with a sad little thump. Before anyone could notice and object, Lloyd gave a huge whoop of excitement. "C'mon everyone! School's out!" Suspenders cried out gleefully and ran out of the pitiful schoolhouse, a chorus of Alice in Chains echoing behind him.

Lloyd ran out of the schoolhouse and made a break for the woods with the rest of the oppressed and hungry children, feeling like a young version of Lenin, but quickly realized he'd forgotten his wooden swords back at the schoolhouse and went back inside to get them. Not that wooden swords could do much damage to anyone, except maybe vampires, and but those weren't _real, silly goose_ , and this is the wrong fanfiction to be debating that. Anyway, he regretted the decision instantly, as his nerdy elven buddy Genis had just woken up from his "nap."

"Uh, hey," Lloyd said conversationally, tying on his "sword" belt, absently wondering why he lacked real weapons in a village that was clearly populated by madmen and abusive psychos like his teacher Raine. Hell, 95% of the world outside of the village wanted to murder and mangle the fuck out of his heroic guts, and he had to face that shit every time he walked home because he lived in the woods for no good reason. Lloyd just hoped Genis wouldn't dignify him with an answer. He hated it when Genis got all smart on him. One of two things always happened when Genis talked – he made Lloyd feel like a moron, which usually got Genis punched, or he made some kind of sarcastic remark, which usually got Genis punched. Lloyd wasn't in the mood to explain all the bruises he was about to inflict on his elven friend to his elven friend's evil sister (even he had enough of a brain to know evil when he saw it), so he just prayed to the Goddess Martel (half-heartedly, he didn't buy into the whole God-crap even though Colette always told him he should) that Genis would shut the hell up.

But because God/Goddess hates our main character, Genis didn't.

Genis brushed his spiky silver hair out of his eyes and waved cheerfully at our main character. "Hi Lloyd."

 _Urgh,_ Lloyd inwardly raged, _here he goes!_ "So," Lloyd said reluctantly, standing around and being awkward and crap, "what's happening?"

"Not much. My head _really_ hurts. I think I have a concussion."

"Right. Right. Cool," Lloyd nodded, clearly not remembering that he had been the one to give Genis said concussion. Life was easier when you forget about stuff like "oh no, I gave that person a concussion" or "I killed this guy, weep for my soul" and just jumped straight punching and ass-kicking. That was Lloyd's philosophy. And because Genis knew about Lloyd's philosophy, having been at the receiving end of it multiple times, he wisely shut up about the concussion.

"Lloyd," a girly voice from the corner of the room said, "do you think Professor Raine will be back?" The voice was of Colette, the Chosen One. Apparently she hadn't gotten the memo when everyone was supposed to evacuate the schoolhouse when Raine went crazy and stuck around like a like a…a fish or a rock or something, I don't know, come up with your own goddamn witty comparisons.

Lloyd thought about the smartest way to answer her question. Keeping in mind that he was standing in front of Raine's younger brother, a wee elven boy whose poor virgin ears hadn't yet been graced by words of the naughty sort, and the Chosen One, upon whose purity the fate of the world rested, he said, "Holy fucking Hell, I hope not. Your sister's completely batshit, Genis."

"You're telling _me_. _I_ have to _live_ with her."

Lloyd laughed in sympathy. "Yeah, Goddess willing, she'll stay far away this time."

"Last time she ran out like this they found her in all the way down in Izoold. Don't ask me how she got all the way there, I have no idea."

"Wow. What was she doing? Making out with another ruin?"

Genis gasped. "How-how do you know about that?"

Lloyd shrugged. "Observation. She gets all hot and bothered when she talks about ancient ruins in class, and she talks about 'em a _lot,_ so I figured she had a fetish. Like Dad, you know, and his thing with high heels?" Genis winced. Yes, he knew. Lloyd continued, "Dad says it's not true, by the way, but I'm not buying it. Plus, earlier this morning, I caught the Professor whispering sweet nothings to that ancient war cannon over in the corner. Pretty messed up if you ask me!"

"Ugh," Genis sighed and kicked the cardboard floor. "I'd been trying so hard to hide it, too…"

"Try harder next time. Seriously, though," Lloyd laughed, "Professor Raine's a messed up wench."

Colette rushed over nosily to join in on the conversation. She put her hands over her mouth to suppress a gasp. "Oh-em-gee, Lloyd, that's not how you should be talking about our beloved teacher!" Despite this berating remark, she cozied up to the red-clad swordsman and batted her eyelashes demurely.

It was a fruitless endeavor; she was no match for Lloyd, master of obliviousness. "Uh, Colette? Were you just listening to anything we were saying?"

"I always listen to what you say, Lloyd," Colette gushed, her face turning several shades of delighted pink.

Lloyd was perturbed. "You're a little _too_ close, Colette."

The cheerful blond slinked away, bitterly disappointed. Genis smacked himself in the forehead. "Lloyd, you are _so_ dumb."

Lloyd cracked his knuckles and glared at his nerd buddy. "Genis, what have I told you about saying stuff like that?"

Genis paled. "Uh-oh…um, um, um, Dwarven Vow Number, uh, Septillion: Never hit your friend that lets you copy off your homework, a-and feeds you d-delicious cookies, because it's mean and cruel!"

Lloyd, unable to resist the powers of Dwarven Vows, quickly calmed down. He'd been ingrained with their power since he was a wee little lad, raised by a crazy dwarf in the woods. Come to think of it, this explains all of his mental problems. "Well…yeah, okay. I'll give ya credit for trying, but that's actually Dwarven Vow number seventeen."

Genis scratched his silver elven head in thought. He'd been grasping at straws. "Wait, you're serious?"

"Yup." Wow, Genis thought, I'm smarter than I thought I was. And just as he was about to make another big mistake by gloating his intelligence above Lloyd again (and thus getting the shit beaten out of him for the millionth time in his life (why was he friends with these abusive people?)), fate chose to intervene by sending a blinding light into the room.

It even came with a nice sound-effect, WHOOOSH. It was as if they had stared into the eyes of God, which they'd stupidly mistaken for the sun and were promptly blinded for their stupidity.

"AHH! AHH!" Colette screamed, covering her pretty blue eyes, "HELP ME, I'm BL _IIIIIII_ ND!"

"Ugh, my photo-receptors!" Genis cried much less loudly and a lot more nerdily. The elf then reached into his magical elven pocket and pulled out sunglasses for the Chosen to get her to shut up. She sighed in relief. "Thanks, Genis."

"No prob."

Meanwhile, "NO, IT'S ARMAGEDDON!"

Genis sighed plaintively at his idiot red-clad friend who was running about the cardboard classroom like a chicken with its head cut off. "No, no it's not, Lloyd."

"Oh. Well, IT'S INDEPENDENCE DAY!" he cried, not slowing in his circles.

Colette didn't help by adding, "But I don't see Mr. Will Smith—"

"It's NOT Independence Day!"

"—OR Mr. Bill Pullman! Or Mr. Quaid!"

Lloyd stopped running briefly and squinted in the bright light coming out of the windows. He appeared in deep thought for all of two seconds before resuming his shrieking and running in circles crying, "CLOSE ENCOUNTERS OF THE THIRD KIIII _IIIIIND!_ "

Genis opened his mouth and then closed it, realizing there was no point. No point at all. Utter fatalism engulfed his skull. Colette took this for a sign and in her poor, idiot, peer-pressured mind, she joined Lloyd in screaming because she didn't know what else to do and couldn't remember the actor's names from _Close Encounters_.

The whole shabang lasted for about twenty minutes, which was more than enough time for Genis to go to the bathroom, run home, grab a snack and come back while Lloyd and Colette worked their way down from their stupidstorm.

After it was done, and rationality was at least partially restored, Genis informed them, "Guys, I'm pretty sure it wasn't aliens. I think it was just the Oracle."

Lloyd was disappointed. "Man, I wanted to see aliens. But it's just the stupid Oracle…"

"But this way, we'll get to see angels! Just as good, right?"

Lloyd didn't need to tell Genis out loud that no, it was not as good. His glare did it for him.

Colette gasped and clapped her hands together. "This means I have to go down to the Temple, to the priests, and then…" she trailed off and suddenly adopted a look that Genis could only describe as pensive, because he'd never seen it on Colette's face before. Her face was usually occupied 24/7 by a vapid smile. He was pretty sure she had the same expression on while she slept. He would've almost called the expression "brooding" but that was stretching it – Colette wasn't _that_ thoughtful. Was she?

Lloyd couldn't stand to be left hanging, though. Hated it when people trailed off and left him hanging. "…and then what?" He demanded, eyeing the Chosen.

"…then I'll get to sing and dance! And throw a party, and um, become and angel! And stuff!" She giggled, which was a total lying tell to anyone who knew. Lloyd didn't know this, because he was dumb, and Genis didn't care, so they just accepted it.

A few seconds passed in awkward silence between the three. Lloyd coughed lightly. "So, what happens? Should we go to the Temple?"

Genis frowned at that idea. "I don't know. Maybe. I mean, seeing an angel will be nifty I guess, but what's supposed to happen? Are we even allowed in the Temple? And aren't the priests supposed to come for Colette?"

"Why are you asking me?"

"I'm not, I'm asking Colette. I'm not even looking at you."

The blond Chosen hummed in thought and tapped her pale, delicate chin. "Well….I know I get the Oracle. And there's an angel involved. And then I go and begin the Journey of **World Regeneration!** "

The elven nerd and his abusive main character buddy oohed at this. "What's that?" they urged as one.

Colette smiled at the attention. "Well, I go on a journey to regenerate the world, sillies. And I do this by releasing the seals, which does something, and somehow fight the Desians too, which does something else, and then I go up to the magical Tower of Tallness and become an angel and some stuff in a process filled with angst, woe, and betrayal!"

And they accepted this.

"Wait," Lloyd had to add, "can we tack on 'bad movie references' to that list of woe and betrayal?"

"Sure, why not? Anything for you, Lloyd!" Colette cooed.

"All _right_!" Lloyd fisted the air in a gesture of timeless cheesiness. "Genis, let's go!"

"I don't know, Lloyd," the elf whined, "what if it's dangerous? Or Raine comes back and finds us gone?"

"What?" Lloyd cried, "I can't believe I'm hearing this!" He waved his hands in his elven friend's face violently to gesture his disbelief. "Danger is our middle name! And screw your crazy sister, this is for the _world regeneration_ , man! It's for a noble cause! Right, Colette?"

"Right!" The blond nodded brainlessly.

The brunette was working himself into a full-on speech, and Genis braced himself: "In times like these, we can't argue over whether or not something's too dangerous for a bunch of teenagers to meddle in, or whether or not our psychotic siblings slash teachers will torture us when we finally get back home. This is for the world! For salvation. Or damnation, I forget which: the point, Genis, is… I forget the point. But we get to see the Oracle, the inside of the Temple, maybe fight a few monsters, rescue some damsels and distress, and who knows? Maybe you'll grow a beard along the way and I'll finally get some action!" He cheered at the end and fist-pumped the air again. Colette cheered with him and applauded because she had started thinking about flowers towards the end of his speech and was a complete sucker for peer pressure.

"You just want to see an angel," Genis smirked.

Lloyd punched him.

A few seconds later the trio stepped out of the pitiful schoolhouse and glanced around the village sneakily. What astounded them, or rather astounded Genis and affected the idiots Colette and Lloyd briefly before their minds settled on better things (butterflies and Salma Hayek, respectively), was the complete and utter feeling of abandonment that surrounded their home village.

"It's quiet," Genis murmured as an eerie tumbleweed rolled on by. He looked over at his companions for a reaction. Colette began chasing a butterfly and making cooing noises.

"Too quiet," Lloyd finished, satisfied that no cliché would be left unfinished, no sir, not while he was around!

A blond man dressed in nondescript clothing with bad five-o'clock shadow and reeking of aftershave stumbled on the three youngsters suddenly. "Why does everyone always finish that cliché?"

Before Lloyd could jump and scream at the top of his lungs, "I NEED AN ADULT" as was his tendency when creepy men with beards approached him, spoke to him, or accosted him in any way, Genis stepped in. "Frank! Colette, it's your Dad! Say hi," he nudged the girl-Chosen.

Colette stopped chasing her butterfly and jumped in surprise. "Hi, Father! Frank!"

"Hi, Daughter! Colette!"

"Yeah, we know," Genis muttered. "Frank, what—"

Lloyd couldn't stand it when other people were in charge of situations, even situations beyond his control or understanding, so he shoved Genis to the side and stepped in. "Frank, what the hell are you doing here? What's going on? Why'd you start growing a beard? And where is everyone? This place is abandoned."

"Not it's not," Frank said defensively, "everyone's just in hiding. And I'm growing a beard because I'm a man and I can and you're not and you can't." This made Lloyd sniffle back a few tears. "Wimp. Look, you kids need to get home, and Colette, get yer butt up to the Temple! You've got an Oracle to receive!"

Colette sighed. "Yes, Father. But—"

"Nuh-uh, no buts, unless it's your butt heading out this village and towards the creepy temple that the Desians just stormed off to!"

There was a moment of strained silence in which the world paused, the winds and waves stopped, and time stood still, waiting for Lloyd to catch up. Genis didn't even bother this time.

" **Desians?** " Lloyd gasped dramatically. "Why would they be here in the village? What? The Temple? Frank? Buh?"

"Yeah, they just went up there," Frank said off-handedly, waving his hand as if it was nothing to worry about, just an everyday happening. "All Nazi-S.S.-like. Götterdammerung and all that. Said they were going to kill the Chosen and set fire to some inferior beings if they didn't get their way. Or maybe it was if they didn't go down to the bay? For some hay? Or get some modeling clay? I don't know," Frank sighed, "It's so hard to hear them through those monkey helmets. But they weren't happy about the Chosen and something or other, and it got messy! Honestly, it was _so_ violent. There was a lot of fighting."

"Fighting?" Lloyd twitched convulsively. Another thing Lloyd couldn't stand: missing out on violence. He felt betrayed that he'd somehow missed the fighting that he had no way of knowing occurred. "What? Shit! I missed the fighting?"

"Yeah, sorry kiddo, you did. Maybe if you hurry you can catch some up at the Temple?" Frank sighed and scratched his manly reddish-blond beard. "Back to the matter at hand, though. So, Colette, you've gotta go up there and get the Oracle. On the double, missy!"

Genis couldn't take it anymore – "This defies all logic, Frank, if they're trying to _kill_ Colette, wouldn't it be wisest to lead her as far away from them as freaking possible? My parents abandoned Raine and I when I was a freaking baby, but you? You are easily the worst parent I've ever met! Also, why in the world would the Desians break the non-aggression treaty? They were the ones who pushed for it in the first place! That's completely illogical, completely nonsensical, and defies everything we know about their tactics! It doesn't _make any_ _ **sense**_!" The thirteen-year-old got so angry that he shoved Frank in the belly with his little elven arms and started growling in a manner eerily reminiscent of his elder sister, a distinction not lost on the suddenly frightened humans around him. "Damn, you, Frank, damn you! Make _sense,_ you pathetic human, make _**sense!**_ ARRRGGH!"

Before he could get any more worked up, Colette had to open her fat mouth. "Of course father, I'll go down to receive the Oracle and try not to get killed on the way!"

"Wonderful, daughter! Good luck!" Frank cried gleefully and ran off, skipping. Lloyd stared after him, wondering what drug Frank was on, and where he could get some. Genis stood there, infuriated, wondering what was wrong with the universe.

And Colette stood there, staring off into space angstily, but before anyone could notice she started chasing pretty butterflies again.

"Lloyd, I think Colette has ADD," Genis said as a way of changing the conversation and not going apeshit over how little sense Frank had made.

Lloyd nodded sadly. "Yeah. Come on, dude, let's get her down to the Temple and kill some Desians."

"You've _got_ to be kidding," Genis guffawed. "Lloyd, we're teenagers, we've never killed anything. We've been living in this village for our whole lives!"

"Correction," Lloyd held up a finger, " _you've_ been living in this village your whole life. I live out in the woods with my Dwarven father. And yes, I have killed shit, lots of shit, mostly just evil bunny monsters, but those totally count. So quit your whining, you dirty atheist," he muttered under his breath.

Genis rolled his eyes and ignored the whining comment. "Okay, fine, but Colette and I haven't. Besides, you have wooden swords. I have a ball-in-a-cup. Colette has… her blondness."

Lloyd shrugged, suspenders shifting. "Oh, and her bitchin' Xena-chakrams, don't forget those!"

"She trips over everything in sight, Lloyd, even things that aren't there. For the love of Martel—I-I mean, for the love of Science, she trips over _air._ You remember that hole in the wall in the back of the classroom?"

Lloyd did remember. It was a big hole. A very Chosen-shaped hole. "You know, to be fair, that wall _was_ made out of cardboard."

"She's a complete klutz, Lloyd. "

"Yeah, and what's your point?"

"Look, I'm not even going to ask you who the crap Xena is or what chakrams are, I'm just going to ask you one thing," Genis conceded and took a very deep breath. He knew he wasn't going to like the answer to this, but he had to know. "Why, Lloyd? Why? We can't fight worth crap, we're kids, and we're rushing after a bunch of dangerously sociopathic Desians who aren't afraid to kill children and were threatening to crucify anyone who got in their way not ten minutes ago. Tell me why." Why am I friends with you, you freaking moron, he unconsciously added.

Lloyd stared at Genis in utter shock. For a minute Genis mistook the look on his face for comprehension, but then Lloyd opened his mouth: "Are you _kidding_ me? Xena's this lesbian superhero chick in a leather bra that runs around, fights evil with her chakrams and goes, 'AI-AI-AI-AI-AIIIIIE!" He yodeled and struck a pose. Colette heard the strange noise and mistook it for singing and so started singing a happy song off the top of her head, loudly, and off-key. Lloyd mistook Colette's singing for screaming and his wooden swords jumped out of their sheaths and started hacking at invisible perps.

Genis rued waking up that morning.

It took a full half hour for the trio to get their shit together and start moseying on down to the Martel Temple, and by that time, Genis was beyond being ready to snap. He had lost it over Frank, and now he was about to lose it over his idiot friends.

His new mantra while he walked became a steady stream of 'ihatehatehatemylifeHATE MY LIFE.'

Only to be interrupted by the appearance of some super bad monsters!

"Oh noes!" Colette cried, falling flat on her Chosen derrière in surprise. "A zombie, a ghost, and a drunken Irishman!"

"What are we, being attacked by stupid jokes?" Genis muttered and then got a good look at the monsters. "Wait a minute, we _are_ being attacked by stupid jokes!"

The zombie was pathetic looking enough, with half of its head missing and one arm gone, the ghost was making Casper impressions, and the drunken Irishman was shouting out a jaunty tune about his sister, oppression, whiskey, and love for a pretty lass he once knew by the river Shannon. Lloyd, at heart a sucker for a good and jaunty tune, began to dance and sing with the Irishman, leaving Genis and the hopelessly clumsy Chosen one to fend for themselves against the joke-monsters.

Genis began chanting a spell in his special elven magic way and ordered Colette to take on the zombie. Colette nodded determinedly and whipped out her chakrams, throwing them about with, if not precision, then at least with enthusiasm.

By the time Genis finished his fire-ball and immolated the ghost (which made no sense, but he didn't want to think about that), Colette had managed to not only not hit the zombie a single time with her chakrams, but manage to trip over air yet again and somehow in the process land on the zombie and crush it to death with her Chosen blondness. They were in luck, too, as the drunken Irishman had just finished up his song and passed out under the table. Lloyd patted the Patty on the back fondly and went back to his 'friends.'

"Shall we continue?"

Genis never once stopped glaring daggers at the red-clad-with-suspenders moron, not once, for an instant, even in the heat of battle against evil rabid bunnies when he "accidentally" sent a fireball at Lloyd's perfect hair, not a single time all the way to the Temple.

Lloyd didn't get it, though. "Genis, is there something wrong with your face?" He glanced worriedly at his glaring elven friend.

"No," Genis glared, "there isn't."

Colette joined in the examination. "You look constipated, Genis, are you sure you're okay?"

If only looks could kill, he thought wistfully. If only, if only.

* * *

 

 

 


	2. Scene 2: A Miserable Old Church

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Genis, Lloyd, and Colette get their asses saved by a Man in Purple. Jokes are made, blondes are clumsy, old women are gross, Bottas are British, Angels are effeminate, teachers are scary, and Genis gets punched.

SCENE 2: A MISRABLE OLD CHURCH

The Temple of Martel was a boring sandstone-colored building covered in miserable old moss and ivy because it was too much of an investment for anyone to hire any sort of long-term gardener, especially when the only people that visited the place were priests, priests, and _more_ priests, excepting only the little boys they invited over for 'parties.' Oh, and that one blond chick that's supposed to save the world. The result was a brownish yellowish hut-looking building with a big unnecessary dome on top, likewise covered with old moss and ivy, from which a Super Special Oracle light was coming out of. They called the effect "Ye Olde Temple" and left it at that because they didn't have any better excuses for their shitty landscaping. The comic contraption that they called "the stairs" leading up to the temple were little than modified slabs of slate which were at present covered in, yes, moss and ivy, and red stains, which may or may not have been from the tons of dead men-of-the-cloth. Although part of it was just red jello and ketchup from the Oracle-Festival they'd had the day before and hadn't cleaned up because they were too cheap to hire janitors. But mostly it was blood from the heaps of dead priests.

Frank hadn't lied about the fighting; Lloyd was twitching at the sight of the priests, not from the injustice of it all but from the fact that he had missed out on whatever happened. He was so irritated that he had missed out that he couldn't come up with a movie reference to save his life. Colette, the nasty do-gooder, was blubbering incoherently at the sight of one of the dead priests, writhing about in trauma and going into shock all over the joke they called the stairs. One of the priests was nearly headless and managed to roll himself all the way down the stairs towards the Chosen One, the force of which made his head come off and land somewhere near Genis' elven feet. Genis screamed like the little girl he probably was and hid behind his main character friend Lloyd.

"I can't believe this!" Lloyd cried indignantly, stamping his feet angrily in redundant anger.

Colette started weeping harder and shied away from the dead priests. "How could they do this? What kind of monsters...!"

"No, I mean, I can't believe that I… ah, nevermind," Lloyd muttered and stalked off towards the Temple. "Whoever did this, I'm killing them with a thimble, Riddick-style—oof!" He tripped over one of the dead bodies Colette-like, landing splat on his face and cursed rapidly.

"Chosen…One…" came a faint whisper from one of the seemingly dead bodies.

"PASTOR JOE!" Colette cried and ran to the side of the nearly-dead Pastor Joe, sobbing erratically into his bloodstained robes.

Pastor Joe was barely conscious anymore. "Chosen…One…Oracle…"

"What?" growled Genis. "Seriously? Desians come and slaughter all of you and all you can think about is the _goddamned Oracle?_ " He raised his tiny fists to the sky and shook them wildly. "I hate this place!"

But no one was paying silly worthless Genis any attention. "Don't worry, dude," Lloyd vowed to the almost-corpse. "We'll avenge your pointless death, I promise."

Colette looked up at her friend with tear filled eyes and smiled. "Thank you."

Genis was an atheist elf with no faith in humanity and snorted derisively. "You don't mean that, Lloyd."

Lloyd thought about this and grinned as unintelligent realization dawned on him. "Huh. I didn't think about it that way. I guess I don't! Thanks, Genis."

Then Pastor Joe died, pointlessly of course.

Genis stared up at the sky, wondering briefly what kind of sick world they lived in and what horrible deity had designed it while Colette got over Pastor Joe's death quicker than she probably should have, suggesting deep mental trauma and probably several hidden mental disorders underneath that drooling exterior. "Wow," Colette squinted up at the Super Special Oracle light. "It's really bright!"

Lloyd nodded in agreement. "Yup. What did I tell you? Apocalypse! It's the end of the world."

"Lloyd," Genis sighed, "the Oracle marks the beginning of the _regeneration_ of the world, not the destruction. You are _so_ stupid."

Lloyd, sick of Genis' snide bullshit and penile name, punched the preteen in the face.

While Genis was recovering from the punch with a tasty Apple Gel, Colette started hallucinating and said that a pretty butterfly was telling her that her ugly Chosen grandmother was in trouble at the entrance of the temple up the hokey stairs. Considering the violent noises that were coming from the top of the stairs (screaming for bloody murder, cut-off pleas, Schwarzneggaresque snarls, cackling, shrieks of agony, and loud sword-clattering), that may or may not have been a completely asinine assertion.

So, the Chosen trotted happily up the crappy steps towards the Temple in a cartoonishly disturbing way. Lloyd shrugged and followed her, and Genis had no choice but to follow the two of them because ultimately, he too was a sucker for peer pressure and also didn't have anything better to do, deciding that anywhere was better than waiting back home for his psychotic sister to show up. (He prayed to Science that Raine had, in her fit of blathering insanity, jumped ship and left town again like last time. With any amount of luck she was in Triet by now.)

At the top of the steps a few guys that looked suspiciously like Desians were threatening an old woman, because they were just _that_ darn evil.

"Tell us where the Chosen is," one of the Desian-like dudes said, presumably the leader. He had some kind pyramid thing that was happening to his hair and was wearing a pretty blue dr—er, a gay looking robe with one sleeve missing for no good reason. The man scratched at his one bare arm absently.

The old woman he was threatening looked him in the eye fearfully, whimpered briefly, and then cracked up. "I'm sorry, I-I…" she cackled raucously. "I can't take you seriously!"

"You dare, old woman!" one of the nameless cronies off to the right side snarled menacingly.

The old woman in question just kept on laughing, bless her old heart. "You-you're wearing a dress! Why are you w-yeah, no, this threatening thing isn't going to work. Dress-boy here is going to have to leave."

"What?" A Desian off to the left gasped dramatically and unsheathed his sword. "You dare insult Lord Botta?"

"Yes, you _dare_ insult me, old woman?" Lord Botta cried apparently. As an afterthought he smacked the Desian to his left silly. " _I_ could have said that, you know."

The Desian in question rubbed his red cheek and started crying like a woman. "I-I was just trying to be he-helpful! Waaagh!"

The old woman just sighed. "Calling me 'old woman' isn't much of an insult, you know. I'm eighty-seven, I've had plenty of years to come to terms with my body and age and—"

"You're _eighty-seven?_ " Lord Botta blurted. "Ew! Old! OLD!"

The other cronies that weren't the one on the left that was crying like a baby sighed amongst themselves. "Honestly, you'd think he was like five," one of them muttered. "I hate my job," muttered another.

One of the cronies looked back to the old woman they were unsuccessfully threatening, whose name was by the way Phaidra. The Desian crony sighed. "Look, if we make dress-bo—I mean Lord Botta leave, can we still stay and threaten you some more? We promise we'll be good. And we'll make sure Karl over here doesn't eat _all_ the potato salad," he added, jabbing a thumb to a Desian on his right who grinned manically.

"I like 'tater salad, mm-hmm."

Phaidra thought about it. "Well, alright, as long as dress-boy leaves, I suppose you boys can stay." The Desians snickered amongst themselves and Phaidra giggled a bit at the sight of Botta's dress.

Botta shot the crazy old woman a glare that would make Baby Muhammad Ali whimper, or it would have if he didn't have silly hair and wasn't in a silly "robe." "It's NOT a dress! It's a robe. And you shouldn't try and antagonize the man who just killed all of your bodyguards in a matter of seconds," Dress-boy added.

"You've got me there," Phaidra admitted nonchalantly in spite of all her fellow dead priests, lying about her in heaps and hacked up body parts and staining the ground with their unending pools of horrifying bodily fluid, "although they weren't actually trained as bodyguards. They were just priests, regular holy men. In fact, I must admit I'm a little confused as to why you haven't killed me yet. You've certainly threatened to enough."

"Unsuccessfully," a Desian to Lord Botta's right supplied unhelpfully. Botta sent him another unsuccessful glare.

"Yes," the old woman continued. "Unsuccessfully."

"We'll do better next time," Botta growled in his British-accent way. "Conan—I mean, VIDARR! Come out and threaten this old woman for me!"

"Why?" Grumbled a deep, threatening, and irritated voice from somewhere off to the side. "Me want take nap."

Botta sighed and ruffled his dress/robe up a bit. "What am I paying you for? Honestly! Get out here or so help me I will _break you._ "

Vidarr, apparently, grumbled and stumbled out into the open. He was a gigantic, hulking, beast of a man who had every medieval weapon imaginable strapped to his unnecessarily broad back including a trebuchet. His face resembled a cave man, from what was not concealed by the helmet that barely fit him. He pulled out a big hammer and started waving it at poor old Phaidra, whose heart promptly started going into fibrillations.

"Uh, Lord Botta?" One of the cronies uttered. "I think she's having a heart attack."

Phaidra tried to gasp in agreement but she was having a heart attack. Botta shrugged it off. "Bah. She's just going into shock or something. She'll be fine in a bit."

"No… no, she won't, sir. I mean, I get that we're supposed to act evil because we're 'Desians,'" the crony finger quoted, "but this is a _bit_ much. Don't we need her alive?"

"Keep talking, Dave. I love back talkers."

"Sir, please, sarcasm doesn't suit you and your accent."

"RARGH!" Vidarr RARGHed and Phaidra started gasping for sweet life and crap.

And just at that moment, our heroes ascended upon the dastardly scene.

"You!" Lloyd cried and waved a finger vaguely at the Desians crowding the area.

"Me?" the Desian name Dave (apparently) pointed at himself.

"No, not you," Lloyd raged, pointing again, "the Brit in the dress. _You!_ "

Lord Botta smirked, the insult going right over his head, and held up his hands in mock-guilt. "Ah, me."

"Yes, you!" Lloyd snarled. "You fucking _douche-copter_! You're the one that killed all these priests! Colette, this is the guy!"

Colette gasped and started crying. "You monster! How could you!" Lloyd had to restrain her from running off and beating the mean man's chests with her weak little fists, so she beat Lloyd's muscly chest instead until she got tired and settled for pathetic sniffling. Then she realized she was in Lloyd's arms against his chest and cozied up nicely, until Lloyd, oblivious as he is, became perturbed and shoved her away. She shuffled off to the side, feeling bitter and a bit hollow.

Lord Botta sighed with heavy sarcasm that was apparent to everyone but Dave. "How could I? Quite easily! And I would've gotten away with it too if it weren't for you meddling kids. And you, Dave. And you over in the corner still crying."

"I'm a v-very em-emotional p-p-person!" stuttered the sniveling Desian. His comrades tried his best to ignore him.

Genis, who had previously been hiding behind his main hero buddy, stepped out into the open and scoffed. "Well gee, I'm sorry, we were trying to help, honest."

Lloyd gasped and drew his swords on Genis. "We were? You tricked me! Benedict Arnold! Judas! You bastard, I thought you were my _friend!_ "

Genis stared in bewilderment. "Crap, I forgot that sarcasm is completely lost on you isn't it?"

"Completely," Lloyd nodded in agreement. And then he forgot and/or got bored with why he was pissed at Genis so he turned back to the Desians, because Lloyd's attention span ran on Duracell. "You douchebag-let Desians are gonna DIE!"

"Desians?" Dave laughed derisively. "He thinks we're Desians. Hah! This kid is _so_ stu—"

"Dave, I've had just about enough of your insubordination," Botta and his skirt threatened.

"Right, sorry sir. We're totally Desians," Dave assured Lloyd and Lloyd's suspenders who looked mildly confused. "Never think otherwise! Yup. Glory to the Age of Half-elves for, uh, life." Dave shuffled from side to side and coughed lightly, something that would have definitely seemed suspicious if our heroes possessed attention spans the length of John Holmes (but we can't all be John Holmes now can we? Goddamn it, women, just be satisfied with what you have!).

Lord Botta silently made a vow to kill Dave later and stepped out of the way for Vidarr to do his nasty work, because everyone but Phaidra had forgotten all about the monster of a man. If one is wondering how it is possible to forget such a large monster of a man waving a hammer as he was above a frightened old dying lady, one is a nerd. Phaidra, meanwhile, was still going through heart palpitations. No one was paying her the slightest bit of attention however, not even Colette, as living in Iselia – as you have no doubt discovered (or will soon discover) – is a pure unending nightmare of which there is no escape for the sane. Absolutely everyone in the village is therefore justifiably a sociopath. Colette, the Chosen One who is meant to save the world, ignored her grandmother's slow and painful death, like everyone else.

Enjoy the end of days.

Vidarr roared in absurdly large fury and everyone trembled in terror, suddenly feeling like small terrified children in a haunted house being molested by a trusted relative again. Genis pissed himself a little bit and curled into a fetal position, sucking his thumb, and Colette was giggling while she squished ants with the side of one of her Xena-chakrams. Lloyd was left to defend everyone himself but despite his naturally pure psychopathic rage that came from some ten odd years of living on the outskirts of the village of Iselia raised by a mad Scottish dwarf, he was still a boy in suspenders wielding twigs against a very large and very angry hulk who had a plethora of medieval weapons at his disposal. Not to mention the trebuchet, which at no point in this plot will be of use to anyone, at all, ever, and is merely there because fuck you.

Lloyd attacked Vidarr once, and his silly wooden blades snapped in half. Vidarr glared down at Lloyd, who leaned away uncomfortably from Vidarr's disgusting monkey-visage. The giant picked Lloyd up in the air with one hand and Lloyd shrieked on impulse, "I NEED AN ADULT! AGH! NO! RAPE! RAPE! RAAAAAAAAA _AAAAAAA_ PE!"

Colette's Chosen ears perked up at her LI's cry of help and worked her way out of her ADHD storm enough to come to his aid. "No one rapes my Lloydie without my permission!" She growled and lobbed her chakrams at Vidarr's ugly head. Surprisingly, they hit and Vidarr cried out in pain, dropping Lloyd to the ground who immediately somersaulted back into action. Lloyd gave Colette a double thumbs' up and she flushed a light pink and returned the gesture. Then Lloyd actually thought about what Colette had just said, but dismissed it as Colette's natural charming stupidity.

" _Ohhhhh!_ " Dave cried from the sidelines, snapping his fingers and gesturing in a comically gangster manner. "The shit's on now, _son_!"

Genis, sensing an opportunity to be sarcastic, immediately snapped out of his stupor. "Because the shit was off before, yes."

Lloyd was confused. "Genis, he just said the shit was _on_. So of _course_ it was off before. That just makes sense!"

"Yeah!" Colette nodded brainlessly.

"Even I'm not that stupid," Lloyd guffawed. "Gee-awd! Why are atheists all, like, retarded?"

Genis glared and shook in his boots in rage but managed to restrain himself.

Colette's attack, while surprisingly successful, had only managed to make Vidarr mad, evidenced by: " **VIDARR MAD NOW! RAAALRARGLARFLARGABAARLGA!** "

Needless to say, our heroes were boned. Lloyd grabbed Genis and tried to use the terrified little elf as a meat shield, and just as Vidarr was about to crush all of our little heroes and their silly Chosen One into Soylent Green, they were saved… by a purple cape, with a man and his extreme upper arm strength attached to it.

A deafening clang resounded throughout the area and the Desians collectively gasped. Vidarr reeled back, overwhelmed by the apparent strength of one man's right arm, a man with a scary face in purple armor/spandex. This man had shoulder-length spiky auburn hair that concealed his eyes which gleamed with _pure murder, bahahahaharr_ , and was accompanied by a happy glare that killed nuns and small orphaned children for sport. He was positioned right in front of our measly heroes with his sword extended in a terrifyingly dramatic pose –everything about this mysterious swordsman, from his sudden appearance to his criminally gelled hair, was clearly portraying that he had just run out of fucks to give.

Genis would have ordinarily laughed in such a situation – hey, dude's in purple armor – but he was too terrified/pissed at Lloyd for using him as a meat shield.

"Whoa," the Chosen blurted and stared at the mysterious man.

"Guhhh," the Desians echoed her awe in a retarded kind of way.

"Who are you?" Lloyd demanded angrily. He was angry because if there was one thing he couldn't stand, it was having his life saved by someone in purple. Also he didn't like it when someone stole his thunder, despite the fact that said thunder had been about to turn him into delicious, delicious crepes not two seconds ago.

"Get out of the way," the man growled and glared at the children, sending them into immediate paralysis and causing Genis to wet his shorts again. The swordsman charged at Vidarr, who started howling in towering fury. The mysterious man and his cape were clearly unimpressed and proceeded to beat the living shit out of the hulking Desian.

The three heroes decided to sit this one out and watched happily with popcorn that Genis made with _magic, mothafucka_ from the sidelines as the purple swordsman went about shanking Vidarr. It was a bloody, vicious battle, and by the end Desian blood was in equal measure to priest blood.

Lord Botta stared up at the mysterious man for two seconds before throwing his arms in the air, waving them like he just didn't care, screaming at the top of his lungs and running away. His cronies shrugged and followed him, likewise waving their arms idiotically and half-heartedly screaming.

Phaidra, who was seconds away from death-by-heart-attack, was quickly cured by the mysterious man who sent a negligent healing spell in her direction. She stood up angrily and brushed herself off while the three heroes finished up their popcorn and joined the scene.

"Thank you for saving my life," the old woman murmured and then sent a cataract-laced glare at Colette, who was only second in obliviousness to Lloyd.

The Chosen One clapped her hands ecstatically. "Oh, Grandma! I'm so glad you're alive!"

"No thanks to you!" She spat. Then she looked over to Kratos. "And you! You may have saved _my_ old life, but if you'd decided to come here ten minutes earlier you could've saved all these priests—"

They ignored her and her valid points. Lloyd squinted at the mysterious long-haired swordsman in purple. "Hey… has anyone ever told you that purple really clashes with your hair?"

"Lloyd, shut up," Phaidra told the idiot absently.

"You shut up…" the swordsman mumbled and folded his arms, pouting.

The mysterious man paled and blanched and did all those things that people do when they go into shock. He looked at Lloyd as if Lloyd were some kind of long-lost estranged loved one. The look on his face promptly died, however... as dead as his soul. "Your name is…is Lloyd?"

"Yeah," Lloyd grumbled, "but who are _you_ to ask for _my name_?"

" _Zam_!" Genis cried and shared a high-five with his best buddy.

"It's Kratos," the swordsman answered. "And I offer my—"

Lloyd gasped in awe and threw his hands up to his face to cover his amazement. "You're _Kratos_? Really? Dude, you are like my _hero._ I couldn't believe it when you made it with Aphrodite. My avatar is dressed up like you. 'God of War' is _amazing_! I can't believe this, Kratos, in real life! Can I have your autograph? Can I? Can I? Colette!" He grabbed the preppy blond girl next to him. "Colette, this is _the_ Kratos!"

"Wow!" Colette grinned. Then frowned. "Um, who's _the_ Kratos?"

Lloyd threw her away in disgust. "You are unworthy!" Colette started weeping.

The swordsman backed away from Lloyd's geekstorm very slowly and very confusedly. Genis sighed and rubbed his brow. "Lloyd, he said _Kratos,_ as in Craw-toes. Not Cray-toes. You freaking idiot."

Lloyd absently punched him and then frowned in confusion. "Crotch-toast?"

"No," Genis mumbled from his prone position, " _Craw-toes!_ "

"Oh. Well, that's dumb."

Genis wanted to add 'you're dumb' but thought better of it, considering he was sprawled on the ground and growing an impressive bruise as a present from yet another one of Lloyd's Exsphere-enhanced punches.

Kratos had been watching the exchange with a mix of disgust and perturbment. "Whatever." He turned to the old woman whose life he had saved. "I'm Kratos Aurion, as I said before these idiots interrupted. I'm a badass mercenary. Pay me enough and I'll protect your precious, pretty Chosen. Pay me too little and she'll have a little… accident."

Phaidra gulped. What was it these days with men threatening innocent old ladies? Had no one a soul? "Right. Um. How much is… enough?"

Kratos and Phaidra negotiated prices, Colette went back to squishing ants, Lloyd made a bad reference, and Genis sighed in deep, abiding depression. Routine. When Kratos and Phaidra were done and told Lloyd that he had to go home, Lloyd objected, which is a vast understatement.

" _ **WHAT?**_ " Lloyd roared and threw what was left of his twigs at Kratos' head. Kratos swiped the twig out of the air with ease. Lloyd roared even more. "I'm going! _We're_ going!"

"Yeah!" Genis agreed vehemently. It was uncharacteristic of him, yes, but he simply didn't want Lloyd to launch into another speech and thought that agreeing with Lloyd was the best way to prevent that.

"No," Kratos told the two simply. "Go home like good little children."

"RAAAAAAAHHH!" Lloyd roared in a manner reminiscent of dearly deceased Vidarr.

Genis had just had enough and interrupted. "Look, Mr. Mercenary guy, we'll stay out of the way and let you kill stuff if that's what you want. But Colette's too blond to function. Just look at her!"

They looked all looked at the Chosen and she flushed at the attention. "What? Is there something on my face?" Her hands fluttered up to her face nervously. Then she tripped over air, scuffed her chin and began rambling about pretty colors. They all looked back at each other sadly.

"Lloyd's special and all but next to Colette he's almost a stabilizing element."

"He is the jock to my cheerleader," Colette crooned dreamily from the ground.

Genis eyed her, disturbed. "Right. Whatever, Colette."

Kratos stared at the Galaxy Trio and then looked to Phaidra, who shrugged. He cursed quietly. This was the Chosen One. This was the individual meant to save the world. He consented. "Fine. But this isn't a goddamn field trip."

"He's right," Phaidra added.

"I'm always right," Kratos huffed.

"…There are monsters and other bad things in the temple."

"Why?" Lloyd had to wonder. "Don't priests work in there all the time? Why would there be monsters in there? Unless…" Genis was about to praise Math and Darwin again that Lloyd had finally asked an intelligent-ish question, but then Lloyd had to go on, "unless the priests WERE monsters! Or were like were-monsters, like werewolves. No, wait, and the monsters in there didn't attack them because monsters don't attack other monsters, right?"

"No," Kratos pointlessly added, because Lloyd just doesn't listen (poor Kratos hadn't been around Lloyd long enough to learn this).

"—And that means those Desian guys did us a favor for attacking them. So the Desians didn't actually break the treaty, they were just being helpful. Unless they're not really Desians, but that's just stupid. Although if that's the case, why was that guy wearing a dress? Desians don't wear dresses. I don't even think the girl ones were dresses. Do they? No, no, they don't… so why was he wearing one?"

"Ooh, ooh, I know, Lloyd, pick me!" Colette stood up and brushed off her pretty white tunic. "Because he was a homosexual!"

"Oh, right, _duh_!" Lloyd grinned and high-fived the blond with a red-gloved hand. "That makes total sense, Colette!"

"No," Kratos said, a vein throbbing in his forehead. A desperate, heartbreaking, and somewhat sad look was coming over his face. "No, that makes _no_ sense. Shut up. Both of you."

"Don't bother," Genis sighed. "Just… don't."

Phaidra couldn't take it anymore either. "Lloyd, granddaughter-Colette, Mercenary, Penis."

"Hey!"

"You have to go into the Temple now. Go see the angel and get your Oracle. There are a lot of monsters. Be super careful. I'm going to take a nap." With that remark, the old grandmother had a fit of narcolepsy and slumped over, snoring like a trucker.

"Aye, aye!" Lloyd saluted dorkily and went to find more sticks to fight with.

Genis and Kratos both stared at Phaidra, and then at Lloyd and Colette sharing a moment of fatalistic confusion. "Why," Genis murmured. "Why does the universe hate me? Why is it so… so full of horror?"

"The universe isn't full of horror," Kratos told the elf, "it _**is**_ horror." And then he went about rounding up the two idiots so they could get on with the adventure.

Genis shuddered, contemplating that philosophy for all of two seconds before deciding that Kratos was kind of a fucked up guy.

Lloyd was positively giddy the instant they entered the miserable old Temple. "So this is the inside of the Martel Temple! It's dark and spooky. I feel like the Goonies," he giggled. "Hey," he nudged his elven friend, "hey, Genis!"

"What," the elf groaned.

"Do the truffle shuffle!"

"For the last time, I don't know what the hell you're talking about."

"Oh, come on!"

"Lloyd," Kratos the mercenary said suddenly. Kratos was a quiet, frightening man and his voice tended to scare people. The three children around him jumped and yelped at the sound of it. "Lloyd," he went on, "where'd you learn your sword skills?"

"Uhh, buhh," Lloyd blubbered, still scared.

Kratos smirked. "If you even _have_ sword skills."

Lloyd glared, a glare that he had clearly just learned from Kratos. It wasn't even half as scary, but it was a heartfelt effort and he deserved a little credit. "Why are you such a dick?"

"Whatever. Here's a book. Read it. Learn it. Live it." He threw a book at Lloyd's main character head and Lloyd, despite having excellent dodging skills, was no match for Kratos' excellent anti-hero aim and promptly got hit in the head and fell over.

"Haha, Lloyd," Genis pointed and laughed.

"Oww…" Lloyd moaned. Genis snickered a bit more and Lloyd kicked at him. Lloyd picked up the book and stared at the title and read it aloud fearfully: "What is this? 'Jamba Juice: A Guide to Boosts?'" He looked up at Kratos' serious scary face, flinched a little bit, and then glanced back at the book. "But… the nearest Jamba Juice is in Triet. What good does this do me? And I don't even _like_ boosts!"

Kratos grabbed Lloyd by the scruff of his ridiculous red shirt and Lloyd yelped in fright. "It's everything we believe in," he growled. Lloyd nodded in terror and Kratos dropped him, stalking off deeper into the Temple with a merrily whistling Colette at his heels.

As soon as the swordsman was out of sight, Lloyd took one look at the book and threw it off to the side. "Why is he such a dick, huh?" He asked no one in particular and shuddered at the thought of Kratos' scary glare.

"I dunno," Genis murmured, "I kinda like him. He made you seem like an idiot."

Lloyd dutifully punched him.

By the time Genis and Lloyd caught up with Kratos in Colette, they were somewhere off in the dark recesses of the Temple. There was a glass floor beneath them full of holes.

"Hmm," Kratos murmured mysteriously.

"Uh, what is this? A disco floor?" Lloyd wondered aloud stupidly and to punish him for wondering stupid things aloud, Kratos pushed him into one of the holes. A few seconds later there was a loud crunching thump.

Genis looked up at the mercenary in awe. "Don't take this the wrong way," the little elf said, "but I think you're my new favorite person." Kratos then sent the kid a mini-glare and Genis started crying.

"LLOYD!" Colette screamed, piercing the ears of everyone in the room. "ARE YOU OKAY!"

"I THINK SO!" Lloyd cried up from the bottom. "Hey, there's this cool ring thing down here!"

A few minutes later Lloyd made his injured way back up to the top glass floor because he'd managed to find some stairs or something, I don't know. There was a big shiny red ring on his pointer finger which he proudly showed off to Colette and Genis, who oohed and awed over it.

"What's it do?" Genis sniffled, as he was still recovering from Kratos' glare.

"Ooh!" Colette gasped and clapped her hands. "It's the Sorcerer's Ring!"

Lloyd gasped too. "It gives me eternal life? That's _awesome_! Take _that_ , Voldemort, you ass!"

"No," Genis sighed and shook his head sadly. "No, Sorcerer's _Ring,_ Lloyd."

Colette likewise shook her head sadly but for different reasons. "I don't see Mr. Riddle anywhere, Lloyd. I'm sorry."

Lloyd frowned in disappointment. "Dang. It's okay, Colette. Well, what's this ring do anyway?"

Colette launched into a cheerful explanation: "It allows you to get passed special barriers here in the Temple I think, and it's super convenient because it changes to suit your needs wherever you go!"

Lloyd frowned, unable to comprehend this in his small brain. "Could it change into a hamburger? I'm really hungry."

Genis and Kratos started cursing under their breaths while Lloyd tried to figure out how the ring worked. Colette kept on rambling and was only shut up when her hair caught fire as a result of Lloyd figuring out how the ring actually worked. Colette started screaming and running around, eventually tripping and falling down one of the holes in the glass floor while the others stood around admiring the Sorcerer's Ring.

"Wow!" Lloyd awed over the sound of Colette's shrieks of agony. "That's pretty awesome! I mean, a hamburger would've been cooler, but still."

Genis scratched his silver head in confusion. "So why do we need this ring anyway?"

"There is a barrier further in the Temple," Kratos rumbled, causing everyone to instinctively flinch. "We will likely need the ring to pass it."

Kratos went to fetch the fried Chosen while Genis and Lloyd admired the ring some more and Lloyd fantasized about hamburgers. Eventually, somehow, Colette stopped crying once Kratos could be bothered enough to send a healing spell her direction, and eventually, somehow, they made their way further into the temple.

"You know," Genis said aloud conversationally, "it's odd how we haven't come across any monsters yet—" Colette, Lloyd and Kratos simultaneously leapt upon the suddenly frightened elf to cover his mouth before the cliché could be finished, but it was far too late.

Out of complete and utter nowhere, four monsters appeared – two giant spiders, a rock thing, and an ugly deformed monster with a foot-ball shaped head that probably was the result of an Alabaman tryst.

Lloyd started giggling. "Hah, look Genis, this IS the Goonies!" He laughed heartily and pointed at the last monster.

Lloyd stopped laughing when Kratos gave him the full benefit of one of his murdering, killjoy glares. "Enough. I'll take on Sloth, Colette and Genis will take the spiders." And then he charged.

"But that leaves _me_ with the Galaxy Quest reject," Lloyd whined but then remembered he was supposed to be still scared of Kratos glare and immediately did as he was told like a good boy, despite how much he resented it.

Clearly, logic lost a fight with giving a damn and Lloyd's twigs managed to somehow kill the rock-monster. Genis sent a fireball after one spider and Colette tripped all over the other, smooshing it to death. Kratos shanked Sloth in two breaths and left the poor deformed beast dead before he hit the ground.

Lloyd mourned Sloth for all of one second before the foursome moved on and got to the barrier Kratos had mentioned before.

It was a blue shiny thing and before Colette could freak out and become mesmerized by its beauty, Lloyd fired a fireball out of his snazzy new ring at it and the barrier disappeared with a pop of displaced air. The dynamic group trotted merrily on, except for Kratos, who trotted much less merrily.

There was a magical warp thingy that led up to the temple and the four clambered onto the small pad which transported them up, but not before Lloyd could cheekily say, "BEAM ME UP SCOTTY" and Kratos could plaintively groan and regret getting up that morning.

The final floor of the Martel Temple was up in the special dome thing, from which a big bright Super Special Oracle light was shining out of. The four put on sunglasses and noted that the light was coming from a pretty gem sitting on the top of some kind of circular dais, which Colette was happy to inform them about:

"Ooh! That's the Cruxis Crystal!" She giggled gaily. "They say I was born with it in my hand."

And then the light stopped beaming and an angelic chorus began to echo around the room.

"Showoff," Kratos murmured under his breath.

"What was that?" Genis demanded, his paranoia spiking.

"Nothing."

Lloyd nudged Genis in the side and snickered, "let's just hope this angel or whatever isn't wearing a dress. I mean, I think I've had my fill today of dress-wearing men, right?"

Genis laughed good-naturedly. "Yeah, definitely."

A big pretty angel descended from the ceiling hole as a glorious light filled the room and bathed everyone in holy radiance. He was blond, wore a funny hat, was beautiful beyond measure, had a pair of spiffy white solid wings, and was wearing a green dress. I mean robes.

Genis pointed and laughed. "Haha, Lloyd. Look. Another dress."

Lloyd stamped his foot and tried to punch the wall in frustration, but failed because Kratos' big hair was in the way.

" **I am Remiel,** " the angel stated, his angelic voice echoing about the room and sending everyone into hushed, holy silence. " **I am an angel of… DISCO, BABY!** " Remiel declared and struck a pose. He looked nothing like John Travolta.

"Hah," Lloyd smirked. "Suddenly that room with the glass floor being a disco doesn't seem so stupid now _does_ it?"

"Lloyd," said Genis.

"Yeah?"

"Shut up."

"No, _you_ shut up, you dirty atheist." And then Lloyd punched Genis for his sins, and Genis cried, but no one cared.

Anyway, at the stares from the four members in the room, Remiel started laughing. " **Hahaha, just kidding. I'm a fucking angel of** _ **judgment!**_ "

Lloyd immediately pointed at Colette in accusation. "It was all her idea! I was just a pawn in the circus! It wasn't me!"

They all stared at Lloyd before coming to the collective re-realization that Lloyd was very stupid, except for Colette who just settled for a heartbreaking frowny-face. Remiel glared, but it was nothing compared to Kratos' glare so they were all desensitized. " **Whatever** _ **,**_ " the angel dismissed with a wave of his holy hand. " **Colette, receive your Cruxis Crystal.** " With a flash of light, the crystal in the center of the room flew and attached itself to Colette's collarbone.

"OW!" she cried and started whimpering. "That hurt, Mr. Angel."

" **Get used to pain** _ **,**_ " Remiel smirked creepily, " **because you're about to embark on a journey of woe and betrayal and it's gonna be filled with a whole lot** _ **more**_ **pain. More pain than you can shake your dick at!** "

"AUGH!" Lloyd cried out, shielding his virgin ears. "I _so_ didn't need that mental image from a man in a dress!"

" **Shut up, you pathetic human** ," Remiel snapped and turned back to Colette, which in no way excused his fashion sense. " **Anyway, I digress. Get used to pain, honey, because life** _ **is**_ **pain, and anyone who says differently is selling something…** "

Colette cocked her head in thought. "Isn't that a quote from _Princess Bride?_ "

" **No** ," Remiel said a little too quickly. " **And to distract you, here's a Tower of Salvation. Behold!** " Remiel threw up his hands and outside the window a Tower of Ridiculous Tallness descended from the sky and landed on the ground with a thump, likely killing many people and cute small animals. The three children stared in awe at the huge Tower, which signaled the beginning of world regeneration and their salvation, before turning back to the angel.

" **So, go now, Chosen of Regeneration, and save the world and…** " He squinted at Kratos over in the corner who was doing his best to look very, very inconspicuous. " **and, you know, stuff** ," Remiel added and squinted harder. Then he grinned in recognition. " **Oh-My-GOD, Lord Aurion, is that YOU? I didn't recognize you in the skimpy armor with new haircut. It's pretty boss, boss! Haha! What's uh, what's going on, man? Oh, what's that? Oh, is this charades? Ohmygod, I LOVE charades,** " Remiel clapped in a gesture that was similar to Colette's and was also disturbingly gay. Kratos had been giving the angel the 'kill' gesture, which Remiel just did not get. " **Is it a dolphin? Ooh, no, wait, a whale! It's a whale, right? Is it a jackal?** "

"Be silent, you imbecile" Kratos hissed. "You'll blow my cover!"

Remiel was confused, briefly. " **Cover? Oh, oh, right! Right. Yeah. Sorry. Um.** " He looked back at the three children. " **Sorry, you're not Lord Aurion, you're just some inferior being-I mean, some silly human. Clumsy me,** " he giggled effeminately with a flop of his hand. Lloyd frowned at this, and frowned harder at Remiel's green dress. " **I mean a** _ **different**_ **Lord Aurion. Totally not you.** "

The three children stared at the duo in confused wonder. In Genis' case, it was really rabid paranoia. Luckily, however, and as we have discussed before, Iselia is filled with apathetic sociopaths. So between the three of them and despite Genis' paranoia, they collectively did not give a shit about Kratos' suspicious attitude towards Remiel and promptly forgot the entire incident even happened.

Remiel coughed lightly and held up his hands once more in a timelessly dramatic gesture. " **Anyway, CHOSEN ONE!** " He declared and the angelic chorus and holy light surrounding around him reached an ultimatum.

Colette gasped in rapt wonder, like a Chosen fish that just spotted its shiny angelic bait. "Yes, oh mighty angel of judgment?"

" **God do I love this job,** " Remiel murmured. " **But Chosen One, Colette, you must go to the Dagobah system and there you will learn how to use the Force and do many things which progress the plot! Look for a guy named Yoda. Just find the swamp area and start yelling 'YODA, YODA' – you'll find him eventually,** " Remiel helpfully added." **I must warn you, though he's a bit… odd.** "

"No," Genis squinted at the angel and pointed, "no, no, no. This isn't MFJ's Star Wars parody that she's working on, this is the regular one. Facts, Angel-man, facts!"

"And stop breaking the fourth wall," Kratos reminded him with a scary glare, which made Remiel gulp. "Seriously, this isn't one of _those_ parodies. Jesus H. Christ. We do have standards, you know."

" **Oh. Right. Forget that part, Chosen One,** " the angel of judgment ordered.

"Okey-dokey, artichokey!" the Chosen giggled.

" **You must go to the desert and wander for forty days and nights,** " Remiel declared." **Or not, that part's actually optional. Always like to have options, you know. And then you must release the Seal. Or… something,** " Remiel muttered and then went poof in a huff of feathers. The light disappeared from the room and the angelic chorus faded out.

The four stood about in awkward silence before Colette giggled to break it. "Well, that's all there is folks!"

Lloyd huffed and crossed his arms. "That would've been more funny if it had been a Porky Pig impression, Colette."

"I'm sorry, Lloyd, I'll do better next time," the Chosen vowed earnestly.

"Well, apology not accepted."

"Enough of this crap," Kratos snapped in his scary way and grabbed Colette by the chosen arm. "The Oracle is done, and we're heading back to the village." He stared deeply and meaningfully into Lloyd's eyes for a few seconds, which greatly disturbed the teen, and then he leapt out of one of the windows with the Chosen and her pretty blond hair trailing after them.

"See you guys at my houuuusee laaatterrrr!" Colette's voice echoed behind her.

Genis and Lloyd stared at each other for a few seconds and then shrugged.

"So, I guess the rumors are true," Genis added as way of conversation.

"The rumors that Kratos is an ass?" Lloyd spitefully offered. "And is also a fag?"

"No, not the rumors _you_ started. The rumors that Colette's the daughter of an angel, not Frank."

Lloyd thought about this, for all that means. "I don't know. Frank is pretty stupid, and so is Colette. It's uncanny, the resemblance."

"You're one to talk," Genis muttered. "But seriously, the similarities were kind of striking, you have to admit."

Lloyd shrugged. "I wasn't paying attention, and besides, didn't Remiel seem kind of, I don't know, what's the word…."

Genis, always (not) the helpful one: "Gay?"

"Yeah, gay?"

"Well, he was wearing a dress. And he was kind of effeminate."

"Effemi-what?"

Genis sighed for possibly the hundredth time that day. "I mean he was really girly seeming."

"Dwarven Vow number one-hundred and ten," Lloyd stated with a dumb grin and a cheesy pose, "if a guy seems effeminate and is wearing a dress, chances are that he's gay and you should shank him!"

Genis stared at Lloyd with a mix of horror and fascination. "Is that a real Dwarven Vow? Did Dirk really teach you that?"

"Of course it is," Lloyd rolled his eyes. "Dad made me to memorize all the Dwarven Vows. Had to recite them before every meal or Dirk wouldn't feed me. And also he hit me. And then I would be hungry so I would have to go take Noishe out and hunt down small animals for food."

"You know, Lloyd," Genis grinned snarkily, "that explains everything about you."

Lloyd was of course oblivious and shrugged, Genis' sarcasm going wasted as usual. "Anyway, let's get back to Iselia. I hate Kratos and everything but Colette's whiny and is expecting us."

"Let's just hope my sister hasn't made it back yet," Genis said, shuddering at the thought.

It is common knowledge that God hates little atheist elves and as such, Genis' sister did indeed make it back. In fact, she hadn't even left. She had been inside the Temple the whole time.

Lloyd and Genis discovered this on their way out, because they had taken the longer, safer path out of the Temple as they lacked Kratos' anti-hero jumping skills. Genis, upon sight of his dreaded evil, evil sister leapt behind his main character buddy and Lloyd unsuccessfully tried to sneak out of sight, forgetting that he was wearing the most conspicuous outfit this side of Vegas.

"What are you children doing here?" The evil, evil teacher whispered. "I thought I told you to stay in the classroom?"

"Actually, you didn't," Lloyd unhelpfully pointed out. "You jumped through the ceiling – which was really cool, by the way – and then left all of us to fend for ourselves."

"Lloyd, no!" Genis hissed and tugged at Lloyd's red Dwarven sleeve. "Logic doesn't _help_ , it only makes it worse! Oh, oh God, I mean, Lord Xenu, I'm gonna diii _iiiieeee….._ "

Surprisingly, Raine took Lloyd's comment very well. She tapped her white chin pensively. "You know what, you're right, I did do that." She giggled and the two boys shuffled, disturbed at the sight of the evil professor's giggling. "Silly me! But I'm still going to punish you." Before the twosome could cheese it she snatched them both by the ear and dragged them back.

Lloyd and Genis started crying for mercy. "OH GOD, _WHY_!" Genis cried pathetically and sobbed. Lloyd tried reciting a Dwarven vow or something but it didn't do any good as Raine proceeded to go Hostel on their underage asses.

It seemed to never end, and went on for hours – unremitting pain and torture, while the evil professor cackled at the lack of child services on the pitiful world of Sylvarant.

By the time it was over, and Lloyd and Genis' body parts managed to reach an Apple Gel and piece themselves together, they vowed to never speak of the incident again. Raine ordered them to go back home and then dashed into the Temple to "study" the ruins within.

From within the bowels of the Temple, however, a mysterious cackle echoed…. Lloyd and Genis glanced at each other once, shuddered, and then ran all the way back home like good little piggies to Iselia and hid under Genis' bed.

A few minutes into that got very, very boring however and then they remembered that Colette was waiting for them back at her house like a dumb fish in a barrel. That made perfect sense.

"C'mon, Lloyd, we've gotta go, Colette's waiting!"

"But what if Kratos is there? Ugh, I don't wanna see that faggot! He's always staring at me like he wants me for my body."

"…You realize he's standing right behind you, right?"

Lloyd whipped around only to face absolutely nothing while Genis cackled mightily at his jest. "Genis…" The little elf backed away very slowly as his psychotic friend advanced on him, fists clenched. And then Lloyd, for certainly not the first or last time that day, happily punished Genis for his sins by a well-deserved punch to the face.


	3. Scene 3: A Sinister Human Ranch

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Operation: Fuck Desians takes place, Frank is kind of a badass, and Dwarven Vow Three-Hundred-One is applicable in an astonishingly wide variety of situations.

SCENE 3: A SINISTER HUMAN RANCH

Lloyd threw the door open to Colette's house with a loud bang and strode in with a wide grin. "Hoo _oo_ ney! I'm _hoooo_ me!" He declared obnoxiously, thumbs snapping his dorky suspenders. There was a moment of silence as everyone collectively winced.

"Oh, Lloyd!" Colette cried breathily and ran to her LI, throwing herself at him. Lloyd didn't see the blond coming and side-stepped, sending her flat on the ground, bruising her dainty chin. She sniffled back the tears that threatened to spill over her pretty face and rubbed her chin in pain.

Genis pointed and had a good chortle at Colette's clumsiness from the doorway. "Bahaha, you suck, Colette!"

Colette's house was less grungy and pitiful than Iselia's cardboard schoolhouse and as such came automatically upgraded and equipped with several adults and table, with which the adults gathered around and discussed adult things. At the head of the table was a creepy fat man with a moustache no one had ever seen before, a manly Frank, a snoring Phaidra, and a scary Kratos. Lloyd gulped at the sight of the mercenary, who stared Lloyd down wordlessly as if he was trying to empathically convey something. Lloyd, naturally, was unnerved. Why was that mercenary always staring? Lloyd had to wonder. Lloyd reasoned that Kratos _had_ to be gay because no other explanation was suitably funny enough to believe in, and something that wasn't funny wasn't worth believing in at all – that was Lloyd's philosophy.

Lloyd looked around the room and whistled at all the impressive adult stuff that was going on – people being responsible was something new to him, as he had lived all his life out in the woods raised by a mad dwarf named Dirk who thought that punching was a form of love and soup was only _real_ soup if it had pipe cleaners and ammonia in it.

An awkward silence ensued. The ditzy Chosen Colette eventually managed to pull herself together and stood over by the table next to her father and snoring old grandmother Phaidra, staring at the wall and musing absently about daffodils and honeybees.

"Heya, kids," Frank said as way of failing to break the awkwardness of the silence.

"Hi," Lloyd and Genis waved.

"So…" the blond man scratched his manly beard. "Listen, we're up to adult stuff over here. Lots of crazy… responsible planning."

"What 'cha planning?" Genis wondered adorably, cocking his elven head to the side. The adults around the room awed, except for Kratos, who did a brick impersonation. The children and their Chosen clapped enthusiastically at his stunning performance.

The man at the table with the moustache coughed lightly and stroked his luxurious moustache. "Well, kids, we're planning the Chosen's **Journey of World Regeneration**."

"Ooh!" Lloyd hopped up and down excitedly like racist at a Toby Keith concert. "Colette told us about that thing. Can we come? Huh? Plee _eeeeaaase_?"

Kratos glared and snapped, "No."

Lloyd took off his smelly red boot and threw it at the mercenary's head. " _ **WHY?**_ " He raged, and then realized he was bootless. " _ **AH! CRUEL FATE!**_ "

Kratos threw the boot right back, hitting Lloyd square in the forehead. "Because you'll get in the way," he spat. "You'll hinder the journey because you're physically inferior and you'll be a distraction to the Chosen One!"

"Actually," Genis whispered and nudged his buddy, "he's got a point. Colette is remarkably stupider than normal when she is around you."

Lloyd stared at the two liked they'd grown seven heads and had declared themselves Dick Cheney, leader of the new world order. "What are you talking about? You guys are nuts, Colette's fine. Right, Colette?"

"Yeah!" Colette nodded happily, proving Kratos' point. "Lloyd's always right! Tee hee!"

"See?" Lloyd cried triumphantly. "And if I had real swords I wouldn't be so bad at swording. I mean fighting. Not that I _am_ bad, ahem."

"Why didn't you have real swords in the first place anyway?" Genis had to wonder.

Lloyd shrugged. "Beats me, but I still turned that rock-thing at the Temple into pebbles."

And they accepted this.

But then moustache man and his crazy facial hair had to get moody: "No. No children on the journey. Just go home. And don't do anything stupid like antagonize the Desians, for Chrissakes! We already have enough problems as it is, we don't need some whiny teenagers going around mucking it up even _more_."

This pissed off Lloyd, to say in the least. If there was one more thing he couldn't stand, it was men with facial hair talking as if they were better than him. He'd had it up to here with Frank's manly I'm-better-than-you bullshit, but this was something new entirely. "Just who the hell _are_ you, anyway?"

"I'm the Mayor," the Mayor with the 'stache apparently crowed.

Lloyd squinted. Iselia had a Mayor? Who would have known? Lloyd had just assumed right along with everyone else that Iselia was ruled by cloud-dwelling ape-men, not that this new revelation made much of a difference. "Really? I've never seen you before."

The Mayor shrugged. "I'm a private person. Also, shut up." And then he booted the main character and his elven sidekick out the door.

Lloyd screamed his frustration at the sky and Genis stood around pretending that everything was normal and that he didn't know Lloyd. It had been a fairly routine day so far. A minute into Lloyd's screaming Colette burst out the door and promptly fell flat on her face, because blondes are comically incapable of going anywhere without tripping over their own feet at least once, according to the mandate of stereotypes.

Lloyd and Genis pointed and laughed some more while Colette dusted herself off and flashed them a sparkle-toothed Chosen grin. "I'm sorry you guys can't come," she apologized unnecessarily. "That's, like, super lame of the Mayor to do that."

"Who said we're not coming?" Lloyd growled. "This isn't over yet, not by a long shot! I'm going on that goddamn journey!"

Genis frowned and decided to test Lloyd's fragile patience, because he had a god-complex. "But, Lloyd, you saw Kratos' glare. And what about all his scarily valid points? Also, what if he beheads us? I like my head where it is, thank you."

Lloyd threw his other shoe at Genis' nerdy elven head in a fit of fury. "Well _I hate_ your spiky elven head. It's ugly and should die! Besides, I'm not taking _shit_ from Kratos. He's a creepy, staring faggot!"

Colette just smiled and nodded, smiled and nodded, and then a light bulb went off in Genis' head as he rubbed the new bruise he'd gotten from Lloyd's shoe – figuratively, of course, since a light bulb actually going off in Genis' head would be a gross and bloody catastrophe. Hilarious and definitely worth depicting, but gross.

"Oh!" Genis cried out and started fishing around in his elven pockets, "I forgot, Colette, it's your **birthday**!"

Lloyd's face became immediately green. 'What?' He mouthed to his friend. ' _Really?_ '

'Yeah,' Genis mouthed back and pulled something out of his shorts. "Here, Colette! Have some goodies! Yum, yum!" He handed the blond a package of squished cookies. They looked _maaagically_ delicious _._

"Cookies!" Colette shrieked in delight and devoured the entire package, plastic and everything. Genis and Lloyd just stared at her as she gobbled it all down, then looked back at each other, and then shrugged.

"So," smirked Genis, "what did _you_ get her, Lloyd? You didn't forget, did you?"

Lloyd shrugged nonchalantly, disguising his inward panic. "Oh, not at all. I was thinking I was going to hit you in the face, you know, for fun. Just for show. I do it every day for lots of reasons but I never do it just for _Colette_ , so this time it would be something special." He grinned menacingly as he cracked his gloved knuckles and it was Genis' turn to be green.

Colette forgot what they were talking about and burped, excusing herself, apologized for no good reason and then left to go back inside her house. Not before tripping all over herself again, however.

Lloyd and Genis stood around awkwardly and scratching their heads, thinking about food and how horrible their lives were, respectively. Lloyd eventually gave up on thinking since it gave him a headache, fetched his missing boots, and suggested that they go over to his house for strudel. This was a good plan, since Genis didn't want to be anywhere near his own house in the event that his sister decided to come home early. He was fairly certain that Raine was still feeling up the ruins over at the Temple but it was a 'better safe than sorry' scenario and if worse came to worse, Dirk was a little slightly more tolerable to be around than Raine.

Besides, there was something Genis had to do.

Lloyd and Genis meandered their way down through the pitiful, sociopathic village towards the entrance where a strange animal was barking and whining incoherently at the two existing Iselia militia members.

"Hi, nondescript militia guys," Genis happily waved.

"Lloyd!" The nondescript militiaman on the left sighed in relief at the sight of the red teen, which was odd because people that usually saw Lloyd were less relieved and more suffering from spontaneous ulcers and/or blindness at the sight of his conspicuous red outfit. "Lloyd, I'm glad you're here."

Lloyd and Genis eyed the militiaman suspiciously. This was highly unusual. More unusual than an angel in a dress. "Why?" Lloyd demanded.

"This… this… thing," the nondescript man pointed desperately at the animal that was lurking just beyond the city "gates." The "gates" were just some kind of wood arch, because the village was too underfunded to afford anything remotely resembling reasonable protection. Also, in the event that the Desians attacked (spoiler alert) the Mayor had declared that he wanted to make it as easy as possible for the Desians to pillage and rape them, since it was common knowledge that the only thing Desians hated more than inferior beings was inferior beings going out of their way to make it difficult for others to pillage and rape them.

Regardless, the peculiar animal that the militiaman had pointed to was a monstrous conglomeration of green and white fur assembled into the shape of a dog with fish ears, if a monstrous green and white dog with fish ears were the size of a horse and whined incessantly for no good reason. In short, it looked like a series of random mammals plus a goldfish said "fuck evolution, yo," had an orgy; in the aftermath of that this animal spawned from the collective Eldritch-horror of that unholy union. Despite its large size it somehow managed to pull of adorable/annoying, although the militiamen were having a different kind of reaction.

The one on the right started foaming at the mouth and fell over, twitching, and as the crazy animal whined in confusion the man started convulsing even harder. "It-w-w-on't-s-stop! Nev-nev-never-s-stop-wh-wh-whin-whining!" he managed to get out before going into a full-blown seizure thrashing about, eyes rolling into the back of his head.

The other militiaman stared for all of two seconds before shrugging, his inherent Iselian apathy taking over. Genis frowned at this. "Hey," Genis scratched his head. "I'm no expert or anything, but he looks like he's in need of help."

The militiaman and Lloyd both scoffed and Lloyd smacked Genis upside the atheist head. "Nah, the dude's fine," Lloyd assured. "Just kick him in the head a few times, he'll clear right up," he told the militiaman. "That's what Dirk used to do whenever that happened to me!"

"That happened to you?" Genis looked up at Lloyd incredulously. "More than _once_?"

"Oh yeah, all the time! I got over it though. Strange, it only seems to happen to people living in this area… must be something in the water."

"…What, you mean something besides the iron, E. coli, and salmonella?"

"Huh? What's E. coli? Hey, what have I told you about getting all 'smart' on me?" Lloyd cracked his knuckles threateningly.

While Genis eyed Lloyd with a mix of terrible amusement and terrible pity, the nondescript citizen shrugged again and looked back at the mysterious animal. "Anyway, Lloyd, get rid of this evolutionary throwback. We can't kill it because we're members of PETA, but you can take it out in the woods and shoot it, right? Old-Yeller-Style? Or don't, that's cool too," he added hastily when he saw the murderous tint to Lloyd's eyes. "Just get it the hell away from here. It's been annoying us for _ages_!"

Lloyd strode up to the animal and tsked under his breath. "Noishe, what have I told you about coming in the village?"

Noishe whined, which Lloyd was apparently able to understand because he and the dumb animal were on the same tantric level of conscious awareness and intelligence. "Oh, hey, I guess you _aren't_ in the village, eh? Good boy!"

The nondescript militiaman went over to his thrashing counterpart and began kicking him in the head unsympathetically. "Oh, hey," he said suddenly, looking back to the two boys and their weird-ass dog-thing. "Don't go near the **Human Ranch** , okay? Because that place is _full_ of pirate-cyborgs that want to eat your brains. Or so my friend Joe tells me. But seriously, don't go near there, they'll probably crucify you and that's bad for PR."

Lloyd nearly nodded but then rubbed the back of his neck awkwardly as one of those rare thinky-moments happened to him. "Why not? I mean, they already invaded us by attacking the Temple, right? I don't think if we went there it would make it any _worse_. Unless it was all some kind of big misunderstanding, but c'mon, how likely is that?"

"Yeah," Genis scoffed nervously.

The militiaman glared at Lloyd, who was unaffected. "Like we need to antagonize the pirate-cyborgs any more. Elf-boy, don't go near the Ranch and make sure Suspenders McIdiot doesn't go near it either." Then he went back to kicking his comrade while Lloyd stared off into space.

"Gee, thanks," Elf-boy grumbled.

After that utterly useless exchange, the two boys and Noishe waved goodbye to the remaining militiaman and his incapacitated counterpart and headed off into the depths of the forest towards Lloyd's home.

That is until they were halfway through the forest and Genis interrupted them. Lloyd, who had been thinking about – well, let's face it, that's a joke in and of itself. Lloyd was irritated nonetheless at being interrupted from pretending to be thinking about meaningful things.

"What? Do you need a potty break again?" Lloyd sneered.

Genis rolled his eyes. "No. Look, I just… I need to run an errand, alright? There's someone around here that I have to meet before we go hang out at your house."

Lloyd frowned, scratching his neck. "Huh? Someone? Who lives here? In the woods?"

Genis glanced from side to side, nodding. "Basically, yeah."

"…It's not Tom Bombadil, is it? Because if it is, Genis, I'm going to have to just say it right now: we _cannot be friends if you are friends with Tom Bombadil._ "

Genis shuddered and rubbed the goose bumps that threatened his arms. "For the love of Science, _no._ I _hate_ that guy."

Lloyd laughed good-naturedly. "I know, right? Everybody hates him. Stupid ass and his poetry… _never_ shuts up! Dad chased him away with an axe that one time and he never came by again but you can still hear him in the deeper parts of the woods, singing and mumbling about stuff. Crazy hermit."

Genis shuddered again. "Ugh. No. Not him. Just… a friend."

Lloyd gasped. Genis had friends? Since when? "Holy fucking Sylph, you have _friends?_ "

Genis glared at Lloyd, who was completely unaffected. Having been exposed to the mercenary Kratos Aurion's glare, he was now desensitized to any kind of hatred conveyed by the ocular areas of the face. It was a condition that everyone experienced after having spent more than five seconds within Kratos' presence.

"Yes," Genis said through gritted teeth. "I have friends. And I'm about to violently lose one of them, too."

Genis knew that Lloyd was, in addition to being as dense as a neutron star, utterly immune to sarcastic jibes and it was unclear as to why Genis tried at all anymore since it was such a fruitless endeavor. Lloyd of course just shrugged. "Well, whatever. Where's your friend?"

"Eh, I'll let you know when we're getting close."

Genis did let Lloyd knew when they got close – it was right around the time they saw a big sign that said _HUMAN RANCH NEXT LEFT – WATCH FOR BEARS._

"Hey, Lloyd, I have to turn here."

Lloyd stared, wide-eyed. "Uh, Genis? That's the Human Ranch."

"Yes."

"That's where the _Desians_ are." Lloyd glanced back at the big bad warning sign. "And bears, too."

"Uh-huh."

"This is very specifically where everyone told us totally _not_ to go."

"Yep."

"These are the guys that burn women and rape crops for fun, or just because it's Tuesday!"

Genis nodded calmly, waiting for Lloyd to finish his routine. "Tuesday's are the ideal international burn-women rape-crops days. Or the other way around, I forget."

It didn't take long – Lloyd gave a huge whoop of excitement and grabbed Genis hand, skipping towards the Ranch. "All _riiiight_! Illegal stuff! Let's go, pet nerd!"

The Human Ranch was, overall, a very terrifying building. Clearly its Desian architects had constructed it to do nothing other than inspire terror – terror was conveyed through every sinister angle of every sinister wall and every sinister corner. Terror was in-between the sinister lines of the sinister electric fence; terror was carried via electrons through all their sinister little electrical cords. As lightning and thunder flashed and echoed from an indeterminate location in the background behind the Iselia Human Ranch, Genis couldn't help but swallow and try not to pee his shorts again (he'd already had to change after their first encounter with Kratos' glare at the Temple and _really_ did not want to have to do laundry today). Lloyd was, by contrast, completely _not_ afraid in any way and was literally bouncing on the balls of his feet in excitement – he starting giggling erratically and clapping his hands and was criminally unable to keep still, which can be attributed to either his stupidity or his ADD. The Human Ranch was still nonetheless a very terrifying facility – if the sinister, dark, and black-colored architecture and evil technological cameras of the place didn't convey that, then what was going on in the courtyard of the facility was all the evidence anyone needed – a line of inferior human beings were being forced to push some blocks around while random Desians whipped them, because evidently somebody was having a funeral and wanted to build a pyramid, but was too cheap to do it themselves (or perhaps it's because the only thing that successfully conveys slavery, desperation, and oppression that we can really afford is an allusion to some Biblical balderdash that happened over a thousand years ago by a bunch of bearded bygones, because having a few folks do some cotton-picking was deemed 'too-soon.' Also, Desians don't wear cotton due to the upper management's insatiable love of spandex.).

Not to mention there was a gigantic sign posted above the Ranch's main gate that said in sinister bold neon letters " _ALL INFERIOR BEINGS WILL BE SHOT ON SIGHT."_

Lloyd clapped his hands and giggled. Genis looked up at him, disturbed. "Looks cozy," the red-clad boy grinned. "I love what they've done with the place!"

"Lloyd…"

"What?"

"Nevermind," Genis sighed and started to walk away, but Lloyd grabbed him by the shoulder angrily.

Lloyd couldn't stand it when people left things unfinished or left him hanging. It was wholly intolerable. Lloyd shook the poor little elf like a box of Shake 'N' Bake chicken. "No, _what?_ _What,_ Genis? TELL ME!"

"Nothing! Nothing, I swear. Just… look," he sighed. "I need to find Marble, and then we need to leave as soon as possible, which means _no_ , Lloyd, no attacking them or drawing attention to ourselves in any way. At. All."

Lloyd rolled his eyes and waved his hand scoffingly. "Eh, what's the worst that could happen? These guys already broke the non-aggression treaty themselves so even if they send that Brit in the armless dress we'd still be within _total_ legal rights to maim 'em."

Genis rubbed his temples, unwilling and unable to quell the frustration that welled up inside of him that was a natural reaction of spending an extended period of time in Lloyd's presence. "Lloyd, these guys kill humans for fun. That Ranch is easily the most terrifying structure I've ever seen."

Lloyd glanced over at the dark, evil, sinister Desian architectural marvel. He cocked his head to the side and squinted pensively. "Nah, I don't see it."

 _Based off of how bad this day has been_ , Genis wondered absently as he experienced a brief fit of nihilism, _I wonder what suicide is like?_ "They've got the resources and man power to not only maintain their tyranny over the whole of Sylvarant but to hunt down and violently murder anyone who opposes them."

"Also," Lloyd raised a sagely red finger, "they're half-elves. Half-elves equal evilness. Don't forget that. That's important."

Genis shifted from foot to foot uncomfortably. "R-right, half-elves equal, um, evilness." He shook his head as if he was trying to get rid of unwanted thoughts. "Desians are a bunch of sociopathic dictators."

"And we're a bunch of sociopathic villagers!" Lloyd pointed out.

The little elf ignored him. "And they've got a _lot_ of superior training on their side. And have vastly superior technology. As in, you know, magitechnology."

Magitechnology is, of course, the mythic combination of magic/mana and technology which is in no way similar to alchemy in any way despite the impossible magic/chemical combination that the two have in common. Completely, and utterly separate pseudo-sciences, despite their very uncanny similarities. Lloyd did not know this. "What's magitechnobaly?" Lloyd scratched his head in confusion. "Is that like alchemy?"

Genis didn't deign to answer that. "No. It doesn't matter, because all you have are wooden swords and your magic stone-thing. And I haven't studied anything beyond wimpy fireballs. God _damn_ , I feel like I've gone over this before or something," he added quietly as a sense of déjà vu came over him.

The teen swordsman snorted derisively. "What's your point, my elven friend?"

"My point is, my human friend, if we attack them or try to defend ourselves against them, we will be _squashed like insects_." By complete coincidence, a spider chose to crawl near Genis' foot and he stamped down on it, grimacing and squishing it into the ground. "Ew. Spiders. Grotty."

Lloyd frowned, rubbing his chin. "Hmm. You may have a point there. But you're forgetting one thing."

"What?"

"We have the advantage of not being dressed like a bunch of S&M hookers."

Genis frowned, rubbing his chin. He glanced down at his somewhat ordinary attire. He looked at Lloyd's Dwarven red nightmare with its white streamers and metallic buttons. "Hmm. You may have a point there. Still, could we at least _try_ to be inconspicuous."

Lloyd laughed innocuously and ruffled Genis' silver hair, which only made the little elf all the more nervous. "Okay, Chuckles," he chuckled, "whatever you say."

Genis' friend was waiting by one of the electrical fences on the left side of the Ranch. His friend was an old grandmotherly woman by the name of Marble. She was disheveled, wretched looking thing reminiscent of Baba Yaga and this distinction was not lost on Lloyd, whom, as anyone who knows him would truly know, was a very superstitious young man.

"Witch!" Lloyd shrieked and did the evil eye.

Marble blinked at him and looked to Genis. "So this is Lloyd, right? That pathologically stupid kid you told me about?"

Genis sighed in mock-sorrow. "Yes. It's a horrible condition. Medical science knows no cure."

Lloyd punched him.

While Genis was recovering from the punch, Lloyd stared at the old woman on the other side of the fence. A delicate little gem on her hand caught his attention. "Hey, is that an _Exsphere?_ " He gasped at the shiny.

Marble glanced down at the shiny gem and rubbed it compulsively. "Oh, this old thing? I don't know, they just put it on me when they processed me. Desians do all kinds of inexplicable things. It's all over my inferior head," she giggled in a brainwashed kind of way.

"Huh," Lloyd tapped his chin, not listening in the slightest. "Exspheres are of the bad, you know, granny."

"What do you mean?" Genis growled from the ground as he slowly stood up, rubbing his pale silver head. "You have an Exsphere, right?"

"Yeah, because I'm awesome. But this old witch is gonna die if she keeps that thing on. 'Course, she'll die if she takes it off." Lloyd paused and suddenly laughed. "Hey, hey Genis, I just understood the meaning of the phrase 'between a rock and a hard place.' Hah! Hah! Ohhh… I made myself sad."

Genis ignored him and turned his attention back to Marble, who was beginning to look mildly distressed at Lloyd's antics. "Don't pay him any mind. Seriously. Don't. It's contagious, I think. Anyway, so I saw the Oracle and—"

Lloyd shoved Genis off to the side directly into a conveniently placed trash can and grabbed Marble's attention again. "Hey, old bat, I got an idea!"

"A marvel, surely," Marble murmured.

"You're lucky that Dwarven Vow number one-ninety-two states that you shouldn't do violence against the elderly," Lloyd reminded her matter-of-factly. "Because Dwarven Vows are the _only_ things I've been taught to hold sacred on Sylvarant. Anyway, Exspheres are super good when they're attached with a sexy Key Crest. It's this gold thing I've got on mine, see?" He ripped off the Scooby-Doo Band-Aid and showed Marble who pretended to be interested and oohed and aahed where appropriate. "But without a Key Crest they're the Beatles without the Lennon. They're…umm…what's the word…uh…"

"Toxic?" Genis suggested from the echo-y trashcan as he tried to wedge himself out, ass-first.

Seeing that his buddy was failing and in need of help, Lloyd helpfully kicked the trashcan over and Genis went squealing down a minor incline away from the Ranch, because Lloyd was a helper. "Yeah. Toxic. But I can probably make one to put over the Exsphere. Or, you know, something. 'Cause my Dad's a dwarf."

"You're half Dwarf?" asked the crazy old bat.

"No," Lloyd snorted, "pfft. Do I _look_ half-dwarf? You're crazy."

Marble frowned. "You may have a point, but that didn't answer my question."

"Ah, but didn't it?" Lloyd pointed out sagely. "Didn't it, Baba Yaga?"

"No, it didn't," Marble spluttered, frustrated, "and you're—you—my name's Marble!"

Lloyd, to the doom and misfortune of Marble, began to wax philosophical. "Is it? Is it really? Or do you just _think_ it is? Does saying something actually give it meaning or classification? Really?"

Marble pretended to think about this. "Oh yeah, you're ri— **no.** It's been Marble my whole long life."

"Well, how do I know that? You could be lying. You could be brainwashed. I don't know, and _you_ don't know."

"But I'm not. And I know for a fact that—"

Lloyd gasped as he felt an epic conclusion entering his tiny mind. "Oh dear GOD, what if I'M lying? How would _I_ know that?" His hands went fluttering to his hair which he began to tear in philosophical agony. "A lie by its nature conceals, but a lie that conceals a lie behind another impenetrable lie? Which is a lie to _oneself?_ I would never know! I would be nothing more than a pawn in the diabolical solitaire of web-checkers! Oh my god, oh my god, I never thought of that before, oh my god!"

"Wha…?" Marble stared at the red idiot in a mix of despair, frustration, and utter bewilderment. "You…but that…no sense make…no…"

"My mind is ABLAZE with realization! No! _Self-defeat_! Everything is MEANINGLESS NOW! _LIES!_ ALL OF IT!"

Genis had managed to wedge himself out of the trashcan and make his way back up to the Ranch and towards Marble. He rubbed his head and muttered to himself darkly only to arrive upon Lloyd's existential crisis and Marble's mind cracking.

"No…but…"

"Genis!" Lloyd cried, tearing his beautiful hair out from its roots. "MY _WHOLE LIFE IS A_ **LIE!** "

Genis took one split-second look at Lloyd before determining that whatever was happening all over Lloyd was something he wanted to be away from, and then turned back to poor Marble. "So, anyway, Marble, I saw the Oracle, and…hey, are you alright, Marble?"

"I…but…he…gwah…" Marble muttered incoherent thoughts to herself and curled into a fetal position, mumbling about circus clowns. Genis stared at her in horror and then looked back to Lloyd who was still going through a stupidattack.

"Lloyd, what the _hell_ did you do to her?" He demanded angrily. "Did she catch your stupid?"

Lloyd began to run in circles. "LIES! ALL OF IT! _AAHHHHH! SOYLENT GREEN IS PEOPLE AND NICOLE KIDMAN AND HER KIDS WERE GHOSTS THE. WHOLE. FUCKING. TIME. NOOOOO!_ "

Meanwhile, in the courtyard of the Ranch, two Desians were idly whipping inferior beings and chatting to themselves. A split second later, they noticed a slight difference in the formerly pleasant atmosphere that was suddenly overwhelmed by teenage screaming and incoherent mumbling.

"Hey," one Desian nudged his buddy next to him. "Check out grandma over there, mumbling to herself," he said and gestured to the corner of the courtyard where Marble was sitting next to a fence, mumbling, while outside the sinister fence two children were squabbling like… like… wily monkeys in a barrel.

"Hey," the other Desian frowned, "who said that old woman could stop being tortured? We're not on break, _she_ doesn't get a break. That's the rule! What's she doing?"

The first Desian observed the scene with a baleful eye. "Hmm. Looks like she caught that kid in the red's pathological stupidity."

The second Desian scoffed at this. "Stupidity isn't contagious. That's ridiculous. Everybody knows stupidity is just a genetic condition of being an inferior being."

"Says you. Besides, doesn't that kid's outfit over there scream 'stupidity' to you? I mean, he had to have been _blind_ this morning or something, to roll out of bed and get into that. Blind _and_ stupid. It's atrocious. I'm going through the camera logs later and catching a still of that ridiculous outfit and sending it to the Darwin Awards or something. Or maybe to the Fashion Police, because seriously, that thing is destroying my eyes. Someone should set that little bastard on fire!"

The second Desian rolled his eyes at the first and put away his whip. "Yeah, you do that, _Ms. Man_ , I'm going over there and figure out what that old lady's problem is."

Marble briefly snapped out of her mad stupor at the sound of Desian boots approaching. "Quick! To the circus!" She cried and jumped at the fence towards Genis and Lloyd, as one was trying to strangle the other, respectively. In Marble's sudden insanity, she stupidly forgot that the fence was electrical and was promptly electrified for her stupidity. Her reaction was like this: "F-F-F-F-F-F-F-U-U-U-C-K-K-K-K!" Lloyd and Genis took this moment to realize what was going on and cheese it to a safer location, i.e. up a hill and overlooking the Ranch, which was in no way out of sight of the Human Ranch's magitechnological cameras that they had no way of knowing about.

"Hey!" The approaching Desian hurried over to Marble and yanked her away from her electric doom. "What the heck are you doing, prisoner? Are you wasting our electricity?"

Marble was too busy going through the aftermath of almost being electrocuted to near-death to respond.

"Because you know what the punishment for wasting electricity is!" The Desian threatened ominously as his hand strayed near his whip.

"N-n-noooo," Marble moaned and suffered a brief lapse of electricity-induced sanity. "N-n-no-nooooo… just… electro-sh-sh-shock… treatment?"

The Desian laughed heartily at this. "Hah! That's pretty funny. But seriously enough, what were you doing over here? Nobody said you had permission to stop being tortured. This isn't a charity."

"Yeah!" Said the other Desian from earlier as he approached the scene. "It's a Human Ranch. No part of that involves the word 'charity.' We brought you here to push blocks and do menial tasks while we stand around and whip you. What part of that don't you understand?"

The first Desian nodded and roughly nudged Marble who was collapsed on the ground with a steel-toed boot. "Exactly. Now, inferior being, what do you have to say for yourself?"

Marble's brief lapse of sanity ended at that choice moment. "Life… meaningless… clowns… circus!"

"Who told you about the clown?" The second Desian roared. He bent down and shook the old woman back and forth violently. "Who did it? Was it Rodrigo? _Tell me you bitch!_ "

"Uh…." The first Desian muttered. "John?"

" _WHAT?"_

"Yeah, don't mind me, just wondering, uh, what in the name of the New Age of Half-Elves are you doing?"

The second Desian, whose name was John, coughed lightly. "Nothing, Barry. Just a little, uh, moonlighting? I-I mean, I was going to tell you about it but it just never came up in conversation."

"…I see." Barry the Desian gave a long-suffering sigh and dragged the crazy old woman by the arm towards the center of the courtyard. "Look, sorry about this, but for us Desians, image is everything. That's the motto. We have to torture the hell out of you to set an example," he whispered to her. Marble continued to mutter about circus clowns.

Our main characters watched this entire sinister exchange from their obvious position on the top of some pathetic little hill. Genis gasped and pointed to the pure, evil horror that was commencing in the courtyard – the Desians known as Barry and John were whipping the hell out of Marble, just like Barry had promised. While ordinarily a person actually living up to their promises would be a rare and sweet thing to observe, like a married old couple sharing an anniversary dinner after fifty years and managing not to strangle each other, Lloyd and Genis were positively outraged.

"Beating on an old woman?" Lloyd muttered through angrily grit teeth. "That's so dastardly evil it's just… ugh!"

"Well, they _are_ Desians," Genis murmured sardonically, and then got serious. "We owe it to Marble to stop this."

Lloyd stood up and dramatically pumped the air with his fist. "Dwarven Vow number two: never abandon someone in need! You're right, Genis!" Genis epically resisted the urge to say 'duh.' "And Dwarven Vow number eighty: never _ever_ face an armed force without a brilliant stratagem! So—"

Genis' draw dropped in awe. "You know the word 'stratagem?"

"Statawuh?" Lloyd guffawed and smacked Genis lightly on the elven head. "What's that? Pfft, Genis, you and your made-up jargon. Anyway, what I was _going_ to say is, I have a **plan** _._ "

The little elf's palm met forehead. "Oh dear sweet Pythagoras, no."

Genis received another, harsher smack on the head for his blasphemy. "As I was saying, I have a plan. I call it Operation: Fuck Desians."

"Gee, what a creative title."

"Thanks!" Lloyd smiled appreciatively. Genis sighed for the uncounted time. "Because seriously, those guys are evil. Fuck them. Anyway, here's how it's going to go down. You're going to send some bitchin' fireballs at those evil dudes Barry and John from up here, and I'm going to run down the fence and try not to get electrocuted. Meanwhile, you'll be running to wimpy safety while I look badass and jump down the cliff. Then, we'll meet up somewhere down the cliff later when we're not corpses."

"That's—" Genis' protest died on his tongue when he came to a completely horrific realization, more horrific than when he realized not moments ago that Lloyd's stupidity was actually, very tragically, very ironically, toxic. "That's… actually a decent plan, Lloyd." He looked up at his main character buddy in undisguised fear. "I'm afraid."

Lloyd smirked and rubbed his gloved hands together in a gesture he'd clearly learned from Professor Raine Sage. "You should be, Genis… _you should be_."

Barry and John had just finished whipping Marble senseless when they did, in fact, see it coming, which went against Lloyd's grand plan. It turns out that it didn't matter, though, as a distraction quickly presented itself:

"Hey, what's that kid in red doing on the fence? HEY! HEY ASSHOLE! GET DOWN FROM THERE SO WE CAN WHIP YOU!"

"Say, Barry, that looks like a fireba—"

The universe is not kind to idiots unless those idiots happen to be main characters, and as such, John and Barry the Desians were incinerated by Genis' _bitchin' magic_.

Lloyd ran down the length of the fence and jumped off, careful to side-step the electrical part that Marble had hilariously electrocuted herself on mere minutes before and began to run towards the cliff nearby which was conveniently located right next to the Human Ranch.

The universe, it must be noted, is somewhat of a fickle thing, and does not appreciate it when its main characters get off easy. Thus, the alarms in the Human Ranch went off with a loud noise that sounded like a dying giraffe and four Desians opened the gates and chased after the red-clad hero.

"Hey!" The leader of the small group of Desians shouted at the teen. "You'll pay for that!" He looked down and noticed a large wooden sword protruding from his chest. "Oh," he remarked, "I guess not," and fell over and died.

In a scourge of bloody, sociopathic, cackling fury, Lloyd leapt at the other three Desians and in a few red-blurred moments, they all lay headless on the ground. Lloyd sheathed his twigs while Genis, who had watched the entire exchange happen frozen to one spot on the ground in trepidation, tried his very hardest not to think about how wooden swords could manage to kill a group of Desians, not to mention the rock golem back in the Temple. It just wasn't something worth thinking about, the little elf rationalized. He knew he wouldn't like the answer and would only end up hating himself for trying, because the universe hated his little guts. A fairly ordinary moment in a life with Lloyd Irving in it.

Lloyd stifled the giggles that came over him when he saw the mangled Desian corpses and promptly leapt off the cliff like a suicidal teenager pining over a sparkly dead boy. Genis took this as his cue to _Chevro-leg_ his way out of there. Eh? Eh? Huh? Yeah? You see that? _Chevro-leg_? Get it? Heh. It's a pun. Heh. Heh. Heh.

Lloyd and Genis eventually met up somewhere back in the forest, where Genis became seized by blathering insanity and demanded that Lloyd take all of his gear, because their adventure was over and it was time for him to go home.

"But I thought we were going to my house for strudel," Lloyd protested, confused.

Genis just gave him a weird, wide-eyed look and shoved his kendama in Lloyd's face. "Take this. And these," he said robotically and passed over the remainder of his gear, which was nothing. "Oh, and this." He handed over his clothes. Genis glanced around from side to side, gave the same weird look back at Lloyd and promptly skedaddled, throwing his arms up in the air and hollering at the top of his little elven lungs about something in a forgotten language that had not been heard in a thousand years and was not meant to touch mortal tongue.

Lloyd looked over at his pet Noishe. Noishe looked at Lloyd and whined. "I don't get it either," Lloyd confessed, shrugged, and began the long trek back to his home.

Erstwhile, several Desians and an important-looking pirate-cyborg in flashy clothing were staring down the cliff Lloyd had just leapt from. The pirate-cyborg possessed teal-looking hair and a missing arm which was replaced by a cannon. He had an air of arrogant importance about him that spoke on volumes whenever he entered a room that conveyed, 'I own you, you inferior thing,' which was coincidentally one of his favorite things to say.

"Check the feed from the security cameras," the pirate-cyborg ordered of his underlings. He glared down the bluff and mused, "how did a mere idiot make that kind of jump?" He then glanced at the three headless Desians corpses off to the side that the mere idiot in red had managed to mangle earlier. "Also, how in hell did _that_ happen?" He cried, his voice rising several octaves. "And how did theyget _ **splinters**_?"

"Well, sir," one of the Desians behind him offered, "he had an Exsphere, which probably enhanced his strength and excuses his mad jumping skills both on the fence and down the cliff, and probably attributes to how he managed to kill our men, and the kid also appeared to be wielding wooden swords for some inexplicable reason, w—"

"I was being rhetorical, random underling."

"Oh. Um. Right, sir. Sorry, sir," random underling saluted.

The teal-haired pirate-cyborg snorted and scratched his futuristic arm-cannon. "You fail."

"Yes sir. _Epic_ fail. I am a complete total failure. All I know is overwhelming fail. Sorry, sir."

"You are dismissed, sycophant."

Lloyd had made his oblivious way back home around sundown, despite having entered the forest around midday. He had gotten distracted after brutally murdering some small bunnies and having to chase after Noishe when Noishe mistook the mangled bunny bodies for monsters and fled with all of Genis' literally worthless gear.

Lloyd's house was a cozy two-floor made out of wood and nails, which put it one step above Iselia whose budget was too tight to afford anything beyond pitiful, pitiful cardboard and even more pitiful public services. Around the property was a peaceful little brook that burbled on by, over which there was a stone bridge which led to a morbid gravestone inscribed with the words " _ANNA IRVING, LOVING MOTHER, MARRIED A CENSORED, PROBABLY DIED IN VAIN_." Other than that tidbit, Lloyd's house was a true example of country down-home livin', which was a completely hilarious comparison in lieu of what ritualistically occurred within the cozy walls of that cozy little house.

"Hey Mom!" Lloyd called cheerily to the gravestone as he stomped up towards his house, Noishe in tow. The gravestone gave a … stony retort.

Lloyd threw open the door to his house and shouted a greeting, which promptly died on his tongue as he watched the scene unfold before him:

"Quick! Get in the closet!" A Scottish voice cried out, followed by two giggles. There was a banging noise and Lloyd's infamous Dwarven father Dirk called out – "Oh hey, uh, son, what are ye doin' here? So early, I mean."

Lloyd stared at the closet where the two women were hiding. "Dad, are those hookers?"

"Nope."

"They were clearly hookers. I just saw you hide them in there."

"I don't know what ye're talkin' about," Dirk said firmly.

"You don't have to hide them Dad. I just don't know why you don't invite _me_ to these things," he added sadly.

"I don't know what ye're talkin' about, boy!" Dirk growled, "and ye'll shut up now if ye know what's good for ye!"

Lloyd just rolled his eyes. "Whatevs, Dad. Look, I'm not even going to remind you about that Dwarven Vow about lying. See that? Generous, right? I'm being a good boy. No need to get all angry and crap."

"I don't know what ye're talkin' about," Dirk mumbled and stomped off towards the kitchen area of the home. "Ye little… mumble mumble…"

"What was that?"

"Nothin', nothin'…"

Lloyd frowned. "No, I heard you. You clearly just called me, and I quote, a 'cockblock,'" he quoted with finger-quotes.

"I don't know what ye're talkin' about! Now get yer stinkin' arse upstairs before I sock ye in the jaw!"

Lloyd dutifully trotted upstairs towards his sad little room, but then he remembered something about some chick named Marble. Oh wait, he forgot. No, no, wait, he remembered, she was the crazy old witch at the Ranch that got whipped. He grinned at the memory of the Desian corpses and stumbled back on downstairs. "DAD, HEY, DAD—" He cried out as he jumped back down the steps and arrived upon a familiar scene:

"Back in the closet, quick!"

The fake-girly giggle of innocence long-lost.

Dirk: "Lloyd, _tell_ me when ye're comin', will ye? By Moradin's beard…"

Lloyd cocked his head to the side in a confused way. "Who's Moradin?"

"Yer real Da', for all ye know," Dirk muttered. "Look, whaddye want? What's it gonna take to get ye outta here and leave me to my business?"

"Your… sexy, _Wild Things_ business?" Lloyd smirked, and then began to gag and horf when he realized Dwarves were short, hairy, gross entities. "Oh god, I made myself sick. Oh god! No! What have I done? Did I just ruin Denise Richards _forever_? Oh Sylph, I think I did…"

"Lloyd!"

"Uh, right, right, listen, I was gonna ask you about Key Crests or… something." Lloyd thought back and struggled to remember. "It was something Dwarf-related."

"Make it snappy."

"Right, oh, I met someone today who didn't have a Key Crest but had an Exsphere, and I remember you saying that that was bad."

Dirk rolled his eyes. "Key Crest-less Exspheres are bad, fire is hot, and yer mother was easy. What else is new?"

Lloyd chose to ignore the mother comment, probably because he hadn't been listening, and continued: "I was wondering if you can make me a Key Crest. You know, for charity?"

Dirk threw his hands up in the air and began grumbling in his Dwarven, bearded way again. " _CHARITY?_ I never hae'd of such a sin! Dwarven Vow number one-forty-three, Lloyd? Need I remind ye?"

Lloyd thought back to all his lessons-by-starving during which he learned the Dwarven Vows. "Um… Dwarven Vow… oh, right: 'there's no such thing as charity, unless you're paid.'"

"Exactly, m'boy."

"But doesn't that contradict Dwarven Vow number two?"

"No. Now shut yer yapper and get upstairs. Besides, what kinda idiot runs around with a Key Crestless Exsphere?" Dirk scoffed, shaking his Dwarven head. "That's the Beatles wit'out Lennon, that is."

"That's what I said!" Lloyd exclaimed. The teenager's sad mind searched and searched until eventually two brain cells won a fight with statistics managed to collide, resulting in Lloyd managing to come up with a headache that is dubiously called an idea. This idea entailed a lie of some kind, which Lloyd promptly stabbed at and failed: "But, yessee, it was some stupid mercenary with dumb hair and a jackass cape that didn't have one. And I was like, 'dude, you're a dumbass and I hate you and also you're a dick, but if you need an Exsphere, I can just ask my Dwarven father.'" Lloyd paused. Dirk stared at the boy he'd raised as his own son with an unreadable expression on his face. "'Dwarven father who is this handsome devil that is just _knee deep_ in women 24/7, so he might be busy, but maybe possibly he could find time out of his day to—'"

"Lloyd, if ye continue all yer arse-kissin', I'mma hit ye," Dirk warned.

"'Maybe possibly just make a Key Crest, but I don't know, because he's like really busy with all the pimping that he's doing, because he's so—"

Dirk swung and hit Lloyd square in the jaw, who went stumbling back against the wall. He gasped in pain. "You… you _hit_ me!"

"I warned ye," Dirk reminded smugly, because he did in fact warn Lloyd and Lloyd knew it.

Still, "What kind of a father are you!"

"The Dwarven kind!" At this point in the generously dubbed 'conversation,' Dirk had just about lost his patience, and so had the ladies in the closet who were beginning to start without the dwarf, judging from the noises to which Lloyd was simultaneously trying to diligently pay attention _and_ unsuccessfully ignore. "'Dwarven Vow number three-hundred-an'-one,'" Dirk recited in his scratchy Scottish way. "'Because, **th'** _ **Hell**_ **with ye**!'"

"Be that as it may," Lloyd said quite calmly, as he was unable to resist the power of Dwarven Vows, "you still punched me. That's not a very fatherly thing to do."

Dirk waved his hand negligently. "Eh, I been doin' it for years. Besides, I got things ta do. Child Services are just a fairy tale to scare bad parents and ye know it, otherwise that Sage woman woulda been lock'd up years ago."

"Mom wouldn't allow it," Lloyd threatened.

"Yer ma's dead," Dirk snapped, "and a bunch o' Desians' did 'er in. Now get outta th' house, ye pot-bellied little nug-humper, or I'll punch ye again!"

Lloyd's poor, small mind could not encompass everything that Dirk had just said at once, and so it focused on the one thing that he absolutely did not understand. "Nug?"

"I'm warnin' ye!" Dirk growled, waving his fist in the air. Lloyd backed away slowly, and then with an ominous noise audible only to Lloyd, it clicked about what Dirk had just said.

An earth-shattering, time-stopping pause. Then…

" _Desians_?" Lloyd gasped dramatically. After all this time, the Desians were the ones behind it all? He thought back to the unresponsive gravestone outside. Desians had put his mother in that grave, and he'd never known. He'd been told a lie his entire life. It was almost too much to bear. And damn it all if Dirk didn't look smug about it. "Bu-but you said a wild _shark_ killed my mom!"

"I lied," Dirk drawled easily. "Sharks aren't native here anyway."

"Because they aren't land-based?" Lloyd helpfully supplied.

"Naw, because they don't eat people, ya idiot… or not as often as I'd hoped… ehh, I forget which. It wasn't me best lie, I admit, but the best lies aren't ever perfect, they're just idiotic enough to be ignored. Sharks, pfft! By the way," he added as he seemed to remember something, and then smacked Lloyd again. "Warned ye twice!"

Lloyd couldn't take this, as demonstrated by, "I can't take this anymore!" And clutched his head, running out of the house sobbing in what was swiftly becoming his second existential crisis of the day – a new record.

As luck would have it, however, he ran out of door and right into the second most least appetizing thing in the world to run into – Professor Raine Sage.

"G-FLCK!" Lloyd choked, eyes wide in terror. "P-P-Pro-pro-f-f-fessor," he managed eventually, coughing and choking at the same time. "Wh-what are you… uhh…" Lloyd trailed off as the memory of his maiming at the hands of his teacher earlier that day, still fresh in his mind, came back to haunt him. It was a wonder how Genis coped with it all.

"Hello, Lloyd," Raine said easily enough. Evidently she had calmed down from her earlier robe-tearing roof-jumping child-murdering episode. "How are you this fine evening?"

"…Is that a trick question? Are you going to kill me after I answer? I knew it!" Lloyd accused. "No matter what I do, you'll just maim me anyway!"

Professor Sage smacked him upside the head and that's when Lloyd realized he wasn't alone. Kratos, Colette, and Genis were also there. "Oh. Hi, you other psychos."

"Hi Lloyd!" Colette cheered and waved her hands in Lloyd's face, which was two inches away. Lloyd very carefully pushed Colette away and backed up several feet, much to the Chosen's chagrin.

"…Right. What are you people doing at my house?" Lloyd paused as another rare thought occurred to him. "You know, if you're trying to rob us, you might want to wait until those two chicks are gone. Then again, they'll probably just steal everything anyway like they normally do, so feel free to burgle any time. It's not a real loss."

Genis' nose scrunched up in disgust. "Your Dad is so weird and gross."

"Yep. He hit me. I'm guessing you guys heard that?"

Raine nodded sagely, which is funny because her last name is Sage, and I'll shut up now. "Yes, we heard the whole exchange. He hit you multiple times. Chances are, though, you were asking for it. You never knew when to shut your mouth, Lloyd Irving. Regardless," Raine sighed a mournful sigh of the suffering teacher whose students are beyond hope, "Colette wanted to talk to you or some garbage so we all decided to tag along because… because…Colette is…"

"…The Chosen is challenged," Kratos finished for her.

"Which is an insult to the challenged, yes."

Colette had been thinking about pretty flowers while the others were talking but then fixed her fluctuating attention on Lloyd. She smiled brightly and snatched his hand. "Let's go up to the terrace, Lloyd!"

Lloyd glanced apprehensively at the house, and then back at Colette. He pulled his hand out of her grasp and shifted uncomfortably. "Yeah, we might want to wait a few hours for that. Dad'll be awhile."

Raine shrugged. "We're hardly short on time. We can wait."

"No, no, you don't understand," Lloyd said and flushed a little bit. "These are the nights when I sleep in the pen with Noishe." He gestured to the green and white monster that was sleeping blissfully in its pen, barking lightly in its sleep, probably having a peaceful dream about eating people. "If I go in there now, Dirk'll just hit me for 'cockblocking' him again and I'll be scarred for life. Again."

"A lose-lose," Genis uttered sympathetically.

"Lloyd!" Raine gasped, shocked at the dirty language. "Is this the kind of language Dwarven upbringing nurtures? I'm going to have words with your father." Pause. She fiddled with her orange robe. "Tomorrow." A shorter pause. "Eh. Maybe. Sometime in the near future," she summed up lamely. "Let's just say that at some point in the space-time continuum, words will be happening and Dirk will listen to them."

Lloyd rubbed his forehead and sighed. "Yeah, no, I'm sure he'll get right on that."

For Colette, this all translated to: "No terrace?" And a frowny-face.

"No, no terrace."

Raine threw up her evil robed teacher arms in the air in disgust. "Absurd! Dwarves are filthy, horrible little creatures. No offense, Lloyd." Then she thought about that statement. "Actually, I retract that – offense was intended."

"Offense taken!" Lloyd smiled dumbly and turned back to Colette. "Look, you want to talk, let's just go stand over there or something."

"Okeydokey!"

Colette skipped happily over to a random area near the woods and the other three wandered around Lloyd's house aimlessly. He stared at the group in confusion, wondering where the hell they were going and what the hell they were planning. After watching Colette hum a happy little song to herself under her breath and rocking back and forth on her heels, he decided to go talk to someone else before opening up that can of olives. As much as he wanted to go on the Journey of Regeneration, because it sounded absolutely awesome and it had to be better than being stuck in Iselia, he had far too much on his mind at the moment (translate: Hahaha! Durr hur hurr). He avoided Genis because of the incident with the clothes earlier that still had him weirded out, he avoided Genis' sister for his own sweet life's sake, so that only left Kratos. _Ugh_ , Lloyd thought, _that asshole. Last thing I need. Still, wonder where he is?_

Unfortunately, Lloyd found Kratos standing over near his mother's grave. This made him mad, because he didn't like Kratos, and because also Kratos was an asshole and Lloyd didn't like him. Plus the whole grave thing struck him as a bit odd. He stomped over to the purple-clad mercenary and tapped him on the shoulder.

"Whattreyoudoing?" He demanded in a manly way, but squealed like a little girl when Kratos fixed the teen with a glare.

The caped terminator turned his enigmatic gaze back to the grave in an expression that would've been pensive if it hadn't been so remarkably enigmatic. "This is your mother's grave, isn't it…"

"Was that a question?" Lloyd wondered honestly. "It didn't sound like one."

Kratos didn't respond because he wasn't paying attention to Lloyd and placed his hand on the cold stone in a familiar kind of way. "Anna Irving," he said under his breath, bending his head. After a few seconds he stood back up from his then-stooped position and stared at Lloyd with eyes that, as Lloyd had the misfortune to suddenly realize, were rather… red.

Lloyd began to back away slowly, unsure of what was happening. What was this? Was this the same mercenary that was standing here five seconds ago? "Well," Lloyd laughed nervously, "good to see you're being a creepy fag again, so I'm just going to go talk to Colette, okay? Pleasedont'killme," he added and ran back to Colette as fast as his legs could carry him.

"So, Colette," Lloyd drawled. Colette perked up and sidled up next to him.

"So, Lloyd."

Lloyd's small, inferior mind fumbled to come up with a topic of conversation. Colette wondered how much orange juice a monkey could drink. "About that Journey you're going on," Lloyd began and trailed off, scratching the back of his neck.

"Oh, yeah!" Colette nodded and gazed up at the star-filled sky almost thoughtfully. "It's gonna be super, er, fun."

Lloyd's puny brain was still struggling. "Uh, yeah, whatever. And that Oracle, huh? That was something."

"Yes, it was… something…" Colette agreed numbly. She pulled back her blond hair over to one side and began running her fingers through it nervously, as if she were distracting herself from something. "And now I have this Cruxis Crystal stuck to my chest," she added and scratched at the jewel. "It's really itchy!"

"What? I was talking about that angel guy. Remiel or whatever."

"Oh, yeah! A real angel! Wasn't that exciting, Lloyd?"

"I don't get excited about men in dresses, but that's not the point. I was just wondering when you were leaving for the Journey, and who all was going on it. Because I'm totally going."

"Totally," Colette repeated brainlessly. Or not so brainlessly? "The Professor is coming, along with Kratos."

"UGH!" Lloyd threw his arms up in the air. "KRATOS!"

"…What?" Came Kratos' voice from the other side of the lawn. Lloyd glanced over in trepidation before shrugging it off. What, did the guy have super hearing or something? He shook his head and began muttering to himself.

"…Anyway," Colette continued, "we're leaving at… uhh… buhh… noon! Yeah, totally noon." She snorted and started giggling madly as Lloyd started backing away slowly.

"Right. Noon," he repeated.

And then for no discernable reason, Colette's mood changed dramatically. She stared back up at the sky, a somewhat sad look on her face. "Boy howdy am I glad I lived to see this day," she murmured in a tone that would've been perceived as bitter if anybody but Lloyd had been allowed to perceive it. Lloyd's mind was on other things, i.e. complaining about Kratos, food, killing Desians, Heather Locklear, etc.

It took the sworder a full minute to realize Colette had said anything at all, which is understandable, all things considering. "Colette? Did you say something?"

"Nope! Nothing. Tee hee hee! Anyways, bye Lloydie!" She clapped her hands, tackled Lloyd in breath-robbing hug and left with Raine, Kratos and Genis tailing after her. Lloyd was left between wondering what the hell had just happened and struggling to recall what time of day Colette had said they were leaving.

Lloyd slept out in the pen with Noishe, of course, and that is where Genis found him the next morning, screaming at the top of his elven lungs for the red idiot to wake the _hell_ up or so _help_ me, Lloyd, I will _murder_ you so freaking _hard_ that you'll be _murdered twice,_ wake _up damn it wake up!_

"Huh? Buh?" Lloyd's eyes snapped open and he squinted as they began to adjust to the morning light. "Whuzza… who dat?" He muttered and tried to make out who exactly it was that was shaking him and threatening to kill him. It wasn't Dirk, and it wasn't Noishe, so it must be… "Oh, hey Genis," he smiled in recognition, and then scowled and punched Genis in the face. "You _know_ I hate waking up!"

"Mah nub!" Genis cried and fished out an Apple Gel to mend his now-broken nose. "Dammit Lloyd!" He yelled as soon as his face was back in working order. "What'd you do that for?"

"For waking me up, goddamn it! We've gone over this before," Lloyd began patiently. "There are only two reasons to ever, ever wake me up, _especially_ by shouting and screaming in my freaking face. One… Genis, I forget, what's the first reason?"

Genis sighed plaintively, ruing waking up that morning. It was beginning to become a very ritual sort of feeling. "If it's the Apocalypse."

"Right, right. And the second one is only if Kratos explodes."

"I thought it was only if there was a wet T-shirt contest going on in the village square again."

"Yeah, yeah," Lloyd waved it off, "that all changed when I met Kratos though. Anyway, is it the Apocalypse?"

"No, for the love of… ugh, you thought it was the Apocalypse _yesterday_ and that was just beca—"

Lloyd rolled his eyes. "Yeah, and it was a false alarm, because Colette told us it wasn't, remember? It was just an angel in a dress with a funny hat and some Desians. In dresses. With funny hats."

"I… I suppose that's true, and Colette may have been right but…" For one of the first times in his life, Genis struggled with words. How to explain this to Lloyd's small mind? He settled for shaking his head and moving on. "Hey, speaking of Colette, guess what? _SHE LEFT_."

"Yeah I k—" There was comically lengthened pause as Lloyd's eyes widened to the size of appetizer plates and his jaw dropped open. "Whaaaaaaat?"

The elf enjoyed that moment for all it was worth. "She left an hour ago. Totally without you _._ I've been trying to wake you up for that whole hour, that's how bad you were."

"Bu-but she told me it was-was at noon," Lloyd spluttered. "I don't understand! Did Colette… holy crap, did Colette _lie to me?_ "

That notion stunned Genis into disbelief for all of two seconds before he started laughing. "Colette? _LIE?_ She probably just forgot what the real time was or something. Colette. Lying. Hah! Don't be ridiculous."

"But—"

"What'd I just say?"

Before Lloyd could punch the living hell out of Genis again, Dirk chose that precise moment to step out of the house and greet the two children by throwing something into Lloyd's face. It clattered to the dirt and the three stared at it for a second until Lloyd finally recognized it. "Oh, hey!" He smiled. "Is this a Key Crest? Dad, you made me a Key Crest?" Then he realized something important. "Oh, wait, I've already got one. Why'd you make me a Key Crest when I didn't need one?"

Dirk rolled his Scottish eyes. "Ya idiot, it isn't for ye. It's for whoever ye were talkin' 'bout last night that ye were lying over. I cannae remember but I figured Dwarven Vows come before bros, which come before ho's, so I owe ye an apology, according to Vow eighteen."

"Apology not accepted," Lloyd smiled sweetly and eyed the Crest. "Thanks, Dad."

Dirk waved his hands in the air modestly. "It was nothing," he said humbly. "Now, what's Dwarven Vow number one?"

"'Let's all work together for the sake of a peaceful world,'" Lloyd dutifully recited.

Dirk gave his adopted son a familiar, warm pat on the back.

Genis stared flatly at the entire exchange between the two males. "How is that vow relevant to anything?" He asked, rhetorical and deadpan, and yet _still_ had the misfortune to go over Lloyd's head:

"Because, duh, the world's only peaceful if bros and hos work _together_ for it. To. Around. Up. At. Moth." Lloyd explained and then blinked, forgetting what he'd been saying or where he had been going with it at all. He shrugged and went with it anyway. "Don't you know anything?"

"What saddens me most," Genis murmured, "is how serious you are about that statement."

"Anyway, Genis, this is yours," Lloyd handed the Key Crest over. "It's for that old bat, remember?"

Genis did remember, oh yes. The old bat that had demonstrated quite tragically that Lloyd's stupidity was very much toxic. Genis didn't quite know what to say to Lloyd's gift, whether he should be grateful or throw it back in the idiot's face. Since he didn't want to get punched again (but the day is still young), he opted for saying nothing and only nodding.

"There's still the issue of the Chosen," Dirk reminded the dynamic duo, bringing them both crashing back down to reality. "Lloyd, off with ye back to the village. You've got a blond to catch up to."

"Lloyd!" Phaidra exclaimed as Lloyd and Genis strode in her front door. They'd managed to make it back to Iselia mostly without hitch. The 'mostly' encompassed violently murdering mentally challenged bears, vegetarian zombies, and chipmunks that got in their way. Before the twosome could answer Phaidra, though, she fell asleep and they were left talking to Frank.

"Colette left already," Frank told them abruptly.

"I like swords," drooled Lloyd.

Genis decided to step in before things got out of hand, as they often (and quickly) did: "We know, Lloyd. Listen, Frank, Colette gave Lloyd the wrong time. I told him it wasn't on purpose because you know how she gets sometimes, but…"

Frank scratched his beard and ignored the little elf. He snatched up a pink piece of scented paper that was on the table in the shape of a paper plane and flew it into Lloyd's face. "That's from Colette. Open it up and read it. Then I want you to get out of my house."

"Sheesh, pushy, pushy," muttered Lloyd as he opened up the pink plane. The paper was loaded with doodle upon incomprehensible doodle, with flowers and little froggies and random squibbles and other made-up things all around the corners and filling the margins, in addition to the dozens of crossed out spelling errors. At the top was a 'Dear Lloyd' written in the most flowery hand Lloyd had ever seen, adorned with more hearts and flowers than humanly possible.

* * *

 _Dear_ _ ~~Noishe~~ ~~Lover~~_ _Lloyd,_ [hearts and flowers and butterflies]

~~I've always loved you~~   
~~You can be a really big dummy-head sometimes but~~   
~~I'm sorry that I~~

_Got you! I totally tricked you! Wasn't that silly of me? I can't believe you_ fell _for it! I felt really, really, uber bad about lying to you,_ [doodle of a sword in the margin, with indecipherable notation: "I drew this is for you, Lloyd, because you like swords!]

* * *

"The girl knows me! I _do_ like swords."

"Damn i—we know, Lloyd, you said that three times before breakfast and two times just now. Just keep reading."

* * *

 _-uber bad about lying to you, because it was really super mean of me and I don't like doing mean things and I cried for like an hour about afterwards but it was for a totally good cause I swear!_ [random hearts and ladybugs]

~~_I'm not going to live for m_ ~~

_Anyway, remember that Journey of Regeneration I told you about? That I have to go on, because I'm the Crystal Dragon Chosen One?_

~~_I didn't want you to see me c_ ~~   
_Turns out that journey is super dangerous and you can't come along because I like like like like like you waaaaaay too much to let you get hurt on this thing. And as it turns out I may be gone for a really, really, really, uber long time. Like, for forever. Forever forever! ~~Because at the end of it I become this angel and~~   [some of what looks like mustard]_   
  
_But I'm regenerating the world so it's not all bad. I go to these Seals and kill things and get special powers, and then I seal the Desians! So no worries! NONE! And at least everyone won't be dead. Especially you. Live long and propser! [poorly drawn Vulcan-hand-sign]_

~~_Hugs and kisses_ ~~   
~~_Mourn me_ ~~   
~~_Joke's on you sucka_ ~~

_Toodles forevs,_ [xo's for half a page and random uneven hearts]  
 _Colette_

* * *

Lloyd carefully folded the paper plane back up and threw it back into Frank's manly face. "Ow!" the man shrieked macho-ly. "What was that for?"

"What the hell is this?" Lloyd demanded. "It sounded like a _will!_ And that in _no way_ explained why Colette lied to me. It was just a bunch of random flowers and spelling errors!"

"I didn't even think she was capable of lying," Genis confessed. "I'm still having difficulty getting over that part."

"I know, right? Whodathunk?"

"Not me, that's for sure. I always thought she was too stupid to lie."

Frank cut them off before they could continue – "Listen, daughter-Colette is going on a dangerous journey across the world to release the seals."

"Which raises the question of why," Genis brought up, his anger from the day before at Frank's bad parenting spiking. "You're letting your own daughter do this? Seriously? And you're not going with her? You're the worst father ever!"

"I'm sure there's some worse than me," Frank said breezily.

"Unlikely," Genis sulked.

"I don't have a choice," Frank said dismissively, an angry look coming into his blue eyes. "I've never _had_ a choice. Colette is the Chosen. We've known this since birth. And the Chosen One goes on a dangerous journey to save the world and kill Desians. That's how these things work. You two should know this, since you saw the Oracle up close. Remember the angel in the dress?"

Lloyd snorted in disgust and threw his arms up in the air. "You _had_ to remind me."

"…But there are some things about the journey we don't tell anybody about…"

Lloyd and Genis' hands went to their chins as they turned to Frank in eager expectance.

"The Chosen," Frank began explaining, "…no, Colette…" He corrected, "is already—"

A huge explosion got in the way of the dramatic reveal-all and Frank cursed like a sailor at the interruption. Genis wondered briefly how it was possible that these explosions were always so well-timed, but before he could say that thought aloud he was cut off by another explosion outside.

A quick trip to the window for the bearded Frank and the two children revealed the true source of the interruption.

" _Whoaaaa_!" Lloyd peered out open-mouthed at the scene unfolding outside. A veritable small army of Desians was parading through the town, setting fire to buildings and people alike while the sociopathic citizens did their best to heed the Mayor's creed and make it easier for the Desians to pillage and rape them. They did this by running around in a panicked disarray while trampling other citizens in a mob-worthy display of showmanship. "Lookit all the Desians! Awwhahaha! Man, those guys are destroying _everything!_ "

"Lloyd!" Genis cried, shaking his friend by the suspenders. "We have to go out there and help them!"

"Uh, why?"

"Because! Those are our friends and neighbors!"

Lloyd frowned. "Huh. I've never seen those guys before. Are you sure about that?"

"Yes I'm sure!" Genis growled, shaking Lloyd harder. "And the Desians are probably after _us_ , or more specifically _you,_ for, uh, well, you know," he trailed off at the sight of Frank's inquisitive face. "that thing. That we did yesterday," Genis finished lamely.

"After _us_?" Lloyd stated dumbly, unbelievingly. He gazed out the window with a deeper, uncaring frown and turned back to Genis. "Well, I'd hate to be those guys."

Frank smacked the two teens and ran over to the door, dragging them behind them. Phaidra, meanwhile, was still napping blissfully throughout the explosions, as old people are prone to do. "Listen to me," Frank bent down whispered conspiratorially. "Doesn't matter why Desians are invading us again. What matters is that they are exploding things and people out there."

"Like in Rise of the Machines?" Lloyd clapped his hands enthusiastically. Genis stared at Lloyd, utterly confused.

"What?"

Frank nodded, though, apparently getting 'it.' Genis was once again out of the loop, but it was a feeling he was getting used to, like a pain he was experiencing so much that he was numb to it. "Exactly. Hell, I wouldn't be surprised to see Claire Danes walking around out there, blowing up crap with her techno-arm. Point is, it's a veritable Michael Bay movie out there. And we've got a village to save."

"But, Frank," Lloyd protested, valiantly struggling with that concept. "Why? I don't like those people and neither do either of you. This place sucks so hard that arson can only make it better. Hell, it'll probably up the property values. So, why?"

The elf and Frank stared at Lloyd. Frank and Genis shared a desperate gaze with each other before Genis turned to Lloyd and said the key words: "If you do this, Lloyd… you get to kill more Desians."

Lloyd bolted out of the door in a heartbeat.

Frank looked down at Genis. "Magic words?" Genis shrugged and they both headed out the door after Lloyd's trailing white streamers.

By the time Frank and Genis got their bearings, Lloyd had already brutally slaughtered seven Desians and was walking away in slow-motion from an explosion, grinning from ear-to-ear, covered in blood.

"Why, _why_ does this always happen?" Genis wondered desperately.

"You missed one," Frank called as he eyed a Desian at his feet that was choking on his own blood.

"Oh sweet Martel," the Desian gasped, "please… please let me… die… _auckflraghibar_!"

"Can do!" Lloyd grinned and behead the poor thing. The two teenagers and the blond man looked at each other, shrugged, and headed towards the next burning building.

The entire town was on fire, but as Lloyd said, it was in fact a good thing. Several citizens were watching Desians torch their own homes and were thanking the confused soldiers profusely, because now with the money from the insurance they could afford homes that weren't cardboard. Lloyd took this opportunity to kill the Desians, turn to Genis and say, "see? Told you so! There's always a plus side."

The threesome eventually, somehow, someway, managed to make it towards the village square, but not before Lloyd could end up covered head to toe in Desian blood from all the Desians he killed. By the end, Genis was scarred for life, Frank was busy not caring, and Lloyd was one happy little camper. The scene at the village square, however, was not a happy camper and was full of the minority of nosy Iselia citizens who a) did not have fire insurance, b) were upset for some reason, or c) bleeding from their skulls.

"I hate this place," Genis muttered darkly as he followed his happily whistling main character bud Lloyd and Frank and Frank's beard towards the center of the village square.

Desians were gathered at the gate and were clustering around each other, when they began to march in place. The town went silent.

"God _damn it!_ " screamed the Mayor suddenly as he ran his chubby little legs onto the scene. "WHAT DO YOU GUYS WANT NOW? HAVEN'T YOU RAPED ENOUGH OF OUR CROPS AND BURNED ENOUGH OF OUR WOMEN?"

The Desians looked amongst each other, shrugged, and said in unison, "Nope."

"Enough of this!" An important-sounding voice resounded. Everyone went silent. Genis climbed up on Lloyd's shoulders to get a good look over the distressed mob-crowd to see what was happening. The Desians shuffled and made way for a very-important looking man from earlier to step forward, one with teal hair and an arm-cannon and an eye-patch.

The reactions amidst the crowd were varied. The Mayor gasped in dismay, the militiaman cried out, "Pirate-cyborgs, fucking _called_ it, George!" And Lloyd cried out, "Samus Aran?" While Frank had an aha moment and declared, "Claire Danes! Look everyone, it's a Terminator!"

Frank and Lloyd looked back at each other in confusion. "Wait, no," they both said at the same time, "that's not Samus/Ms. Danes, that's not a girl at all!" They quickly glanced back from the annoyed pirate-cyborg back to each other, and then back and forth. "Is it? Nawww... but I can't be sure!"

"It's not a girl," Genis whispered down from Lloyd's shoulders.

"SILENCE, YOU INFERIOR THINGS!" The pirate-cyborg announced. Everyone's attention went straight back to the commanding presence. He coughed lightly, popped in a cough drop and went back to looking menacing. "My arm cannon demands your attention. Listen well, inferior beings – for one of you, possibly two of you, maybe three – I was never good at counting you dirty apes – has broken the non-aggression treaty!"

"Nuh-uh!" A little child cried out from the mob. The mob grunted and grumbled in agreement. "You broke the treaty when you attacked the Temple, you big fat jerks!"

"We're not fat," one Desian sycophant grumpily retorted.

"You, child: be silent," the pirate-cyborg commanded. "You, mob: listen. The Desians didn't attack the Temple, but it's no surprise that you think we did, because you're all a bunch of filthy, _filthy_ idiots."

"Hey, we aren't filthy!"

"Speak for yourself, Mikey."

"SILENCE!" Dead silence once more. "We promise to stop pillaging you once you hand over the human named _**Lloyd Irving.**_ " There was a collective gasp. Genis' hands clutched Lloyd's hair tight in fear. Lloyd was fairly nonplussed about it all, and Genis, realizing that the reason Lloyd was so nonplussed, whispered down, 'they're talking about you, Lloyd!' Lloyd, in response, gasped and dropped Genis to the ground with a high-pitched yelp. 'shit, shit, shit!' he mouthed, miming panic as he tried to hide in the crowd.

The villages grumbled, unable to reach a consensus. One nondescript man finally stepped forward. "Take the 'promise' part out of that and we'll hand him over. You guys are doing wonders for our property value."

A certain elf in the crowd was, meanwhile, cursing the world, his ancestors, Iselia, and everyone and everything around him.

"Hey, just who are you anyway?" Frank demanded loudly.

The pirate-cyborg smirked. "Tremble, for I… am **Forcystus** , Desian Grand Cardinal!"

There was a loud, long, estranged moment of pause before two certain children who were trying their hardest to hide in the crowd simultaneously fell flat on their asses and started laughing hysterically. Frank, very poorly did not succeed in containing his laughter for long.

"Ahahahahaha! Hah! Aaaaaahahahaha! Ahahah. My. Gooo-ahaha-awd!" Genis shrieked in uproarious delight, doubling over, unable to contain himself.

Lloyd was on his hands in knees, clutching his stomach in pain he was laughing so hard. "Bahahahahahaaaaaa _aaaaahh!_ Genis, Genis you-y-you… mahahahahaaa!"

"I know, I know! Fahahahaha!"

"What is so damned funny?" Forcystus mumbled.

"IS… is… that your real name?" Frank managed in-between fits of giggles.

"Yes," Forcystus said anxiously, anxious to find out what joke he was missing in on.

Lloyd and Genis and Frank laughed all the more harder, rolling around on the ground in the back of the crowd, giving an entirely new meaning to the leetspeak phrases 'lmao' and 'rofl.' After several long minutes of Forcystus' paranoid demands of what the hell was so funny and Genis and Lloyd's peals of laughter, the two managed to calm down enough to get back on their feet.

"Ahh, hoo, wow… okay…" Lloyd grinned at Genis and the two started laughing again.

" _WHAT? WHAT ARE YOU INFERIOR BEINGS LAUGHING ABOUT? I DEMAND TO BE IN ON THE JOKE!_ "

Seeing as Lloyd and Genis were once more incapacitated by peals of laughter, Frank took the opportunity to fill Forcystus, the Grand Cardinal in. "Your name," Frank laughed, "your fucking name sounds like a venereal disease, that's what's so funny!" And then he started laughing some more.

Forcystus was, needless to say, very upset with this. "No it doesn't."

"HAH!" Lloyd cackled and pointed at the teal-haired cyborg. "Why didn't you just n-name yourself _Syphilis! Save you the trouble! BAAAAahahahahaha!_ " And the hero and his buddy were lost in laughter once more.

"That's it," Forcystus growled in his pirate-cyborg way. He itched at his cannon and twitched convulsively. "You're all dead. All of you!"

"No, wait!" The Mayor cried out. "These two are idiots! Kill them and let us go!"

"Hey," Frank cried out, suddenly becoming serious and realizing what was about to go down. "You're not a very good Mayor, Mayor!"

"Shut up," the Mayor snapped childishly.

" _ **YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAR!**_ " Frank gave an epic battle-cry worthy of medieval ballads and leapt at the Mayor in a fit of homicidal rage, punching and gouging like no other.

Lloyd and Genis stopped laughing immediately and stared. "Holy shit," Lloyd muttered, "Frank's, like, a badass."

"Yeah," Genis nodded, "Who would've thought?"

Venereal-disease man had tolerated enough inferior beings for the day and shot his arm-cannon into the air, sending a huge beam of green light skyward. The sociopathic villagers stared in wonder at the pretty light while Forcystus teleported away with magic or something, I don't know, and a giant monster-looking thing descended upon the crowd.

The crowd, cowardly by its nature, dispersed. Genis and Lloyd had the misfortune to not be cowardly, so the monster-thing attacked them.

There was really no apt way to describe it: it was tall and green, with a beak and no feathers, more akin to a skinless velociraptor with all the charisma of a disheveled potato sack full of dead rabbits. It gave out a cry that sounded like a muffled dying ferret, though where exactly it gave this cry from was a mystery for the ages as it possessed no mouth. Genis tried to figure out how exactly it breathed while Lloyd, who was armed with real swords for a change, valiantly attacked the beast.

Lloyd used his natural savage fury with all the power of his Dwarven Vows but the hideous beast was winning a battle of attrition, as despite Lloyd's Exsphere (which the monster-thing matched by having an Exsphere-looking object wedged into its "face" where its "eyes" should "be"), it was still significantly larger and gross beyond the point of recognition.

Genis eventually managed to snap out of his horror-fascination to send a few fireballs at the monster-thing with his _magic kendama, bitch!_

It was at this point that something very, very tragic happened.

"… _.Genis…_ " Came a ghostly voice. IT was coming from the monster.

Genis gazed in amazement and guilt as he raised his tiny fists to the sky, "NOOOOO! MAAAARBLE!"

Lloyd didn't remember who Marble was, and stabbed the monster while it was distracted. It promptly died. Genis sobbed erratically, Lloyd stood around awkwardly, Frank was still violently assaulting the Mayor for no good reason, and the Desians minus Syphilis stood around, wondering what to do.

"Well, now what?" They muttered amongst themselves. "I thought that thing was supposed to kill Lloyd."

"You wanna pick a fight?" Lloyd growled, bearing his teeth and his swords.

The Desians scratched the back of their heads beneath their helmets confusedly. "Well, we don't have orders to… so I suppose we'll let you go," one of them finally said. He stepped forward and pointed at Lloyd threateningly. "But mark our words, you'll pay for this! You and your Exsphere are property of the Desians!"

Lloyd went into a panic attack at the sound of that. "RAPE! RAPE! RAAAA _AAAAAA_ PE! I NEED AN ADULT!"

"No, Marble, _whyyyyyyyy_?"

The Desians skedaddled whilst Lloyd jumped up and down in a blind stupor, covering his ears and screaming about pedophile Desians. Genis continued his womanly weeping while the peasants crowded the square and wondered about peasant things, such as their new insurance money and how much orange juice a monkey could drink before dying.

The Mayor eventually managed to push the rabid Frank off of him while Frank, foaming at the mouth, dropped to the ground and began having a seizure.

"Don't worry," one of the two militiamen said. "That happened to me earlier today, Frank. We'll kick you in the head a few times, you'll clear right up."

"It's amazing how that works," the other militiamen said to his compatriot.

"You two!" The Mayor huffed and pointed at the children. Lloyd paused in his panic and Genis started whimpering slightly less loud. He fixed his hair and rubbed at the deep gouges in his face. "You two are a disgrace!"

"Yeah, but thanks to them," one of the villagers reminded, "we have money for actual housing instead of cardboard."

"Yeah, goddess bless insurance."

"And with the Chosen on her Journey, things can only get better from here!" One woman cried triumphantly, and the villagers around her rallied. "We're all saved! Goddess bless the Chosen and bless the Desians!"

"I don't care!" The Mayor snapped and pointed at the two children menacingly. "You two are outta here!"

Genis snapped out of it and sniffled back a gasp. "N-no! You're going to **exile** us? That's not fair, I say, _not fair!_ We're just poor homeless children!"

"Well, maybe you," Lloyd muttered as he saw Genis' house out of the corner of his eye slowly burning to the ground.

The villagers murmured in their disagreement. "Surely that's a little harsh, Mr. Mayor," the woman from earlier cried. The militiamen began to kick Frank in the head, and Frank, sure enough, the man started to clear up, much to everyone's relief.

The Mayor looked startled, and for all the wrong reasons. "Great Scott, no – I was just going to make them do endless hours of community service, but exile's a _much_ better idea! Why didn't I think of that first? Kids, from here on out, you're exiled. Get the hell out of my village."

Lloyd, for possibly the millionth time since knowing the blasphemous boy, punched the punctuals out of Genis until the little elf knew nothing of his entire existence but absolute agony.


	4. Scene 4:  A Sweltering Desert

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lloyd and Genis experience the wonders of exile in their pursuit of Colette.

SCENE 4:  A SWELTERING DESERT

Lloyd and Genis had been wading through the scorching desert dunes for hours and Lloyd hadn't ceased complaining for one second.

It was for this reason that Genis was seconds away from strangling Lloyd with magic and dumping the body somewhere in sand, where no one would ever find it without in-depth archaeological excavation.

Genis, however, would not murder his friend Lloyd, because he was a good little boy and didn't go around murdering people. This was what his conscience was trying to tell him based off of what had happened with dear old granny Marble back in Iselia before the two boys had gotten exiled and Lloyd had beaten Genis up as a result; Genis' conscience, as it may be known, was a bit of an asshole in addition to being an appalling failure at maintaining moral high ground. _This_ could be attributed to Lloyd's presence since Lloyd had this annoying tendency of corrupting anything and anyone he stood around for longer than five minutes. For example, Genis tried to blame Marble's death on Lloyd, and yet somehow couldn't bring himself to it since he knew for a fact that Lloyd hadn't actually intended to kill Marble. It wasn't even an honest mistake – Lloyd had fully intended to kill that disgusting green raptor-thing, and yes, Lloyd did not know that it was really Marble, which excuses why he'd even tried to piss on the corpse afterwards but because Genis wouldn't let him Lloyd had to settle for doing a macabre victory-mambo over poor Marble's remains. Genis just knew and simply could not and would not ever _unknow the fact_ that Lloyd had totally and utterly forgotten who Marble even was by the time he had killed her. There was utterly no point in blaming Lloyd for it because Genis knew that the whole incident with the Exebula would have inevitably slipped Lloyd's short-term mind entirely by that point. It was also very possible that Lloyd just lost a fist-fight with giving a damn, but either way had the same outcome – Genis knew Lloyd well enough to know that blaming the idiot for killing something was utterly fruitless in the end. He reasoned it was more of a blessing than a curse because in some ways he truly envied the guilt-free, free-loading lifestyle that Lloyd naturally habituated. Lloyd was living proof that things like intelligence and learning were curses. As a result, Genis then tried to blame the Marble incident on the Desians, on Frank, on the militiamen, on the Mayor, on Frank's random badass assault of the Mayor, and even once tried to rationalize that it was all the fault of Kratos' hair, but at the end of the day Genis kept pointing that annoying finger of morality at himself. He didn't like it. He didn't used to have this problem, probably because he'd grown up in Iselia his whole life. It was really just depressing.

But these things are far from the point.

"Hey, Genis," Lloyd moaned.

Genis didn't answer. The elven boy didn't _dare_ answer.

"Genis, Genis, Genis, Genis, Genis, Genis, Genis, Genis, Genis, Genis!"

The unfortunately named little elf buried his sunburnt face in his hands and wept a bit. "Wh-what?"

"Nevermind, I forgot."

"Swear to … Lovecraft, Lloyd… gonna… kill you," he muttered. The two children then plodded on in uncomfortable silence, slowly being cooked in the sweltering heat.

To say that it was 'hot' was an understatement. The heat from the Triet Desert's sun was literally baking them into toasty little children-shaped crisps, and not in the good way. If they _had_ been baked in the good way they would've at least come across food, water, and a plethora of Doritos at some point; 'twas telling that there had been a suspicious lack of chips throughout their short adventure. They were starved and dehydrated, and Lloyd was evidently getting tired of walking: "I AM SO GODDAMN SICK OF WALKING, GENIS."

"So am I! Shut up."

"I'M HUNGRY AND THIRSTY TOO. SO … _THIRSTY!_ WHY DOESN'T THIS DESERT EVER SEEM TO END? OH GODDESS, _WHY!_ "

Genis slapped himself in the forehead. "For the love of Capitalism, stop _yelling!_ You'll attract a sand worm or something!"

Lloyd blinked in confusion. "Oh. Sand worms, huh? Are those bad?"

"Yes, you dumb-a—I mean, yes they're very, very bad," Genis corrected immediately at the sight of Lloyd's glare.

"…You're bluffing! And I'm still _so thirsty, dammit!_ "

Although at one point, Lloyd did think that he saw water in the distance and sent them chasing in the wrong direction. He thought he saw it again later, and again, and again, and again, and around the seventh time was the breaking point for Genis, when the poor child had to stop them and waste a good twenty minutes attempting to explain to his buddy what a "mirage" was. Lloyd still didn't get it by the time it was over, so Genis had to settle for telling him it the "water" was a trick from the trickster desert gods so that the two of them would wander off and die of exposure in the middle of fucking nowhere, which would satisfy the gods' tricky, evil, and mysterious children-killing agendas. Lloyd bought this baldercrap and Genis didn't question it anymore, since he was really tired of questioning things about Lloyd.

The two children stumbled on wordlessly, each silently praying to different and equally nonexistent deities that they would eventually make their way to Triet. In Genis case, he also prayed for the off-chance that if they died someone would eventually stumble their starved way across their corpses and bury them before vultures or zombies caught them. The second to last thing Genis wanted was to die at Lloyd's side – the very last thing he wanted was to die at Lloyd's side and get raised along with Lloyd as a zombie, and/or be picked to death by nasty vultures as a corpse at Lloyd's side. He kept an emergency will in his pocket in the event that either happened, and it read simply: "BURY ME FAR AWAY FROM LLOYD IRVING," because he didn't want corpse-cooties. Genis wondered briefly why exactly it was that he was travelling with Lloyd in the first place, and then remembered it was because he had no home and literally had nowhere to go, because his home had been burnt down by Desians who had been hunting Lloyd, and the two children had been exiled anyway as a result of the Mayor getting cranky over said Desians going hunky-dory with the home-burninating. (It was also probably Frank's fault too. Genis didn't know how, but he'd be damned if he couldn't find a scapegoat for this scenario, and Colette's incompetent bearded father was becoming a fast favorite blame-all-cure-all … right next to Lloyd's stupid suspenders and the angel Remiel's dress.)

As for Lloyd, Lloyd was doing his gosh darndest not to think about the incident in Iselia at all. All things considered he was doing a pretty good job of that. He didn't want to let on that he had secretly hated Iselia (it wasn't a secret) and that really, getting burned down was the best thing that could've happened to that town, and since he was a really bad liar he felt that keeping his mouth shut about it was the best thing to do. If anyone asked him about it, he told himself that he was just going to say that he 'didn't want to talk about it' and whoever it was would probably peg him as one of those strong, brooding types, which was a total plus in anyone's book. Also, like Genis, he was mostly blaming Frank for everything that happened. He didn't know how it was Frank's fault, but it was. All in all, 'twas possibly the one smart thing Lloyd had ever done, and it was even in accordance with Dwarven Vow Number Seventy: when in doubt, shut up and blame someone else.

It was a matter of a few sunburnt hours before they made it to the Desert Oasis, Triet. Lloyd's brain had been fried by this point and when he saw the city, he said, "Is that… _Eldorado_? Genis! My elven compadre, we made it!"

"No … no … we … ugh." Genis didn't have the energy to correct Lloyd so settled for waving his hand in the general area of Lloyd's face as a pathetic, starved, dehydrated attempt at slapping. Genis felt like crying when his hand didn't collide with face and almost did weep, except he'd already been dried out of all moisture and was slowly turning into elf-jerky.

Regardless, Lloyd mistook the slapping attempt for a wave and waved enthusiastically back. "Hi, Genis!"

"Fu … fu … fu … ck … y … ou …"

"Huh? What was that?"

"Water, need … water," Genis amended.

Lloyd nodded and the two made their fried way into Triet and towards the nearest thing that looked vaguely like tasty liquid. To their incredible luck, it wasn't a mirage and was actually water this time.

The two teenagers almost went face-first into the Triet oasis in an effort to drink as much as possible in as much time as they could. It didn't occur to them that someone might actually own the oasis, or that someone had something nosy to say about their scarfing down of the precious liquid:

"Hey!" A tan little boy in a turban and a white salwar kameez shrieked obnoxiously.

Lloyd and Genis glanced up, bleary-eyed. The kid looked a bit flustered. "Hey, uh, stop in the name of, er, the trickster desert gods! You can't drink that water! This is _my_ oasis!"

Lloyd and Genis looked to each other, wordlessly communicating, and then looked back to the kid. "Where's that written?" Genis asked politely, wiping his mouth off on his shirt sleeves. Lloyd went back to drinking the precious, beautiful water.

"Huh?" The child stuttered. He scratched his black-haired head hidden beneath his turban.

"Where's it written that this is your oasis?" Genis clarified. "If that's a law written somewhere, I'd like to see it."

"The, er, the trickster desert gods wrote it," the boy lied, and then when he saw the elf's bloodshot, hate-riddled eyes, corrected, "hey, it doesn't have to be!" The kid spat and stamped his foot. "This is my oasis! I guard it. That's my one and only job."

"Well you're not very good at it," Lloyd scoffed.

The turbaned child flushed a deep crimson. "That's just 'cause you jerks are making me look bad. You took me by surprise. Most people around here _know_ that this is my oasis, so they don't pull this junk! Anyway, get out of my precious, beautiful oasis."

Genis thought about answering this but nudged Lloyd instead. "Let it be known that I tried reason, and now I wash my hands of this," the elf-boy muttered sadly and went back to gulping down the water. Lloyd stood up, brushed the sand off his silver-buttoned red coat, marched up to the Trietan child, and stuck a gloved finger in his baby-fat face. The kid jumped back, frightened.

"Hey, _turban_ ," Lloyd growled and tapped the scared kid on the nose, "I'm gonna freaking _piss_ in this damn oasis. What are you gonna do about it?"

"I-I," the kid stuttered, trying to come up with a decent comeback. His mind finally settled on one and he straightened, looking Lloyd in the eye confidently. "I am going to be very angry with you! And will write you a strongly worded letter telling you how angry I am! _That's_ what I'll do! Boy will you be sorry when I'm done, yes you will!"

Genis nearly choked on his water at that and Lloyd did something resembling laughter but it came out as a threatening rasp, due to the desert cooking his throat and the long hours of dehydration he'd just ended. "Joke's on you, kid, I don't read!" Lloyd and his suspenders declared. "Anyway, you get right on that." Lloyd turned back to the water as the kid angrily stomped off, probably to rant to some nameless turbaned superior about the inconsiderate people that were contaminating his precious, beautiful oasis.

"Uh, Lloyd," Genis objected just as Lloyd looked like he was about to unbutton his pants, "could you pee in the oasis _after_ we're done drinking it?"

It took Genis and Lloyd a good hour of lounging by the oasis to get the energy to get back off their feet and find some shelter. Or rather, it took Genis a good hour to convince Lloyd that they needed to stop lounging around and find shelter, and right after Lloyd took a whiz in the oasis (and the two teens were done snickering about it) the dynamic duo flitted off to find an Inn. Or something.

"Say, Genis," Lloyd wondered as they wandered the sandy, dirty streets of Triet. "What are we doing?"

"Walking."

"No, I mean, what were we looking for again?"

"Why me?" Genis moaned to the sky. The sky had no answer and Genis had to take a reality-check. "Right, you forgot. I get it. Uh, so, we're looking for Colette, because we're going on a journey to save the world. Because we got—"

"—Exiled, right, I remember that," Lloyd interrupted with a nod. "I remember _distinctly_ it was all Frank's fault."

"Totally Frank's fault," Genis agreed. "Anyway, I think I heard Raine mention something about going to Triet before and that angel in the dress—"

Lloyd roared in disgust and threw up his arms. "Why does everyone have to remind me of that? **Augh!** " Genis waited patiently for the sworder to finish.

"…Anyway," Genis eventually continued, "there was mention of a Fire Seal in the desert. And that is where Colette will be."

"And your evil sister," Lloyd reminded, and Genis grimaced at this. "Are you sure you want to find them?"

Genis sighed and threw up his hands helplessly, because he honestly didn't know the answer to that question. "Kratos will be there too, so that'll be okay."

"Blarg!" Lloyd roared and threw his arms in the air again in disgust. "Let's just hang out here in Eldorado until those filthy bastards are finished with their epic quest or whatever." He folded his arms and proceeded to act huffy.

Genis frowned. "But I thought you wanted to kill Desians."

"Oh, right." Lloyd stopped huffing and tapped his chin thoughtfully. "Man, what a dilemma!" Before he could start thinking any more, however, something short-circuited in his brain, "oh. Dear. _Goddess_ ," Lloyd cried and jumped up and down with glee and pointed. "Look! A fortune teller! _Awesome!_ Genis, let's go spend all our money in that tent!" He grabbed his elven friend's hand and bolted towards the _maaaagic_ fortune teller's tent.

Genis was so tired of protesting to the things Lloyd did. He just wanted it all to end, one way or another. He almost wished Colette were nearby, but then tragically realized that Colette would only be a catalyst to Lloyd's behavior, not a balance. It was enough to make him cry.

The little elf was still crying by the time Lloyd dragged them into the tent. The tent on the inside was colorful and full of smoke from the piles of mysterious incense left carelessly smoldering about the dirty floor-area. A suspicious woman in gypsy garb sat at round, scarf-covered table, hunched over a clouded crystal ball – all in all, the only thing that was missing was a Zoltar machine. Lloyd began dancing and throwing his arms around like a five-year-old and Genis did his best to simultaneously pretend he'd come inside by accident and stifle his tears of grief.

The gypsy at the center of the room began cackling and the children backed up a bit. "I _seeeeee_ your _fuuuuture!_ " She cried mystically and swished her hands around her crystal ball. Genis rolled his eyes and Lloyd clapped like a giddy school-sworder.

"Oh great and mighty Fortune Cookie Lady," Lloyd implored, "tell me my fortune!"

The gypsy smirked enigmatically. "I _shaaaaaall_! But first… payment, of course!"

"Of course," Genis muttered and sniffled back the tears that threatened to come over again. His poor angst-ridden life was just so unfair.

Lloyd slapped three-hundred gald on the table and the fortune-teller proceeded to go about telling fortunes. "What do you seek?" She inquired mysteriously.

The small elf was suddenly struck with an idea. "Ask her where Colette is!" Genis hissed quickly.

"What?" Lloyd guffawed and leaned over so he and his bud could have a private conversation. The fortune-teller started whistling idly to herself and playing solitaire with her Tarot cards. "Pfft! No way, that's a lame question. I'm gonna ask her what you all think of me."

"Don't be a—uhh, a Dwarf, Lloyd," Genis stuttered, and then scrunched up his face when he realized what a lame insult he'd said. He shook his head back and forth and went on. "Seriously, what if this fortune-teller lady is for real? And you asked her some dumb question about your friends!"

Lloyd's eyes lit up with realization. "You're right! My friends aren't cool enough to waste this opportunity on."

Genis rubbed a silver eyebrow and shrugged. "Sure, whatever. But there's the off-chance that this lady is totally real and you'll have wasted that only chance to ask her something important—"

"How is ' _durrrrr_ , where's Colette?' an important question? That sounds more like the _lamest_ question ever. We already know where she is anyway."

"It's important," the elf hissed, leaning in more closely, "because we already _know_ where she is! And if the fortune-teller tells us that she's at the Seal of Fire, then we'll know she's legitimate. And _then_ ," he breathed, "we can demand that she give us free fortunes and stuff so we don't report her to the desert police as a fraud! I mean, what do those stupid desert cops know? We could tell them Colette's in Izoold and the fortune-teller lied to us and those dorks will totally believe us, because she's a _minority_! It's the _perfect_ plan!" The elf cackled. "Bwahahahaha!"

Lloyd eyed his buddy as if the elf had grown a very suspicious-seeming appendage. "That's downright evil, dude."

Genis flushed to the tips of his ears. "Y-yeah, but it's in accordance with Dwarven Vow… uh… what Dwarven Vow is this in accordance with?"

"Nineteen," Lloyd said breezily, "which mentions something about gypsies being filthy, thieving, hunchback-dating liars that are _never_ sexy, except when they are. The rest deals with melodramatic song and dance numbersand witch-burning, I think. You're right, though. But what if she's totally a fraud? What then?"

Genis laughed and said the magic words: "Who gives a shit? We leave and get some lunch."

"Good plan!" Lloyd flashed a grin and ended the private whisper-conversation with a high-five, finally turning his attention back to the fortune-teller. "Okay, I know what question I'm going to ask."

"Then ask your question," the fortune-teller murmured duskily.

"Where's… umm…" Lloyd struggled valiantly to remember the name of his blond idiot-friend. "Uh… whatshername. That blonde girl. The Chosen. Oh! Where's the Chosen One!"

"I can't believe you forgot Colette's name," Genis snickered, and Lloyd decked him.

"I see…" the fortune-teller lady muttered and gazed intently at her ball, enraptured by whatever visions she saw within its murky depths. "I see… a blonde idiot! Yes!"

"She's a total bimbo," Lloyd confided conspiratorially.

"I noticed," the gypsy snorted. "And she's heading towards the Fire Seal. I see her clearly now! Yes! The Chosen is accompanied by a silver-haired woman and… and... I see… also… " She squinted, as if something about looking at a crystal ball was hard to decipher. "…I see…"

The red-clad dwarf-boy was at the edge of his seat in suspense. "You see what, what? What is it? Who's the other? Whaddya see, crazy lady?"

"…It's a homosexual in a cape!" She crowed in triumph.

Lloyd jumped up and cheered out a squeal, pumping his fists the air with joy. " _ **YES! I! CAAAALLED IT!**_ "

Genis nursed his new bloody nose a bit and downed an apple gel while he stared at the fortune-teller in fascination. "Lloyd!" He pulled his red-clad main character buddy aside. "This means she's _for real! Blackmail 'er, blackmail 'er!_ "

"I prefer 'extortion,'" Lloyd told Genis coolly. "The 'x' makes it sound better."

"Who cares?" Genis rolled his eyes and shoved his friend back over to the fortune-teller.

By the time the two amoral children were done working over the filthy gypsy fortune-teller, Genis knew the Palmacostan lotto numbers for the next three weeks, and Lloyd knew the exact opinion of all of his friends in the history of ever, in addition to the unwanted opinions of Colette, Genis, Kratos, _and_ Raine, _and_ was informed that somebody had a portable shrine of him in their backpack. He wasn't pointing fingers or jumping to any conclusions, but he knew it was probably Genis. He just didn't understand why the trickster desert gods decided to surround his manly hetero muscly-ness with fags all the time. Was he being punished for something? What had he done to deserve this?

The two teens were in the process of stealing lunch from hapless passersby, as they had couldn't buy food because they no money to speak of (having wasted it all on the fortune-teller and being Lloyd being too incompetent and Dwarf-brainwashed to steal it back). Eventually they grew bored (or full) of that activity so they decided to see if they could steal some water from somewhere that wasn't the pee-infested oasis and trudge their reluctant way towards the Chosen and her Seal of Fire.

"You know what I don't get?" Lloyd suddenly interjected.

Genis didn't want to know, and knew he'd regret asking. "What don't you get?"

"How… a seal… can be made of fire. I mean, don't they swim all the time and eat fish? How can they do that while on fire?"

"Magic," Genis said sarcastically, which was sad because Lloyd did not understand sarcasm and took this as an acceptable answer.

"Magic? Wow! That makes so much sense! That explains everything."

"I really ha—whoa!" Genis spluttered, luckily enough finding something to grab his attention before he could finish that sentence. The two kids were passing by a building and the community billboard when something on it caught his attention… a picture that…

Genis began to laugh uncontrollably. Lloyd saw what he was laughing at and grew very angry, but soon was unable to contain his laughter as well.

"This looks like it was drawn by the German doctor from Human Centipede," Lloyd cackled and tore the picture down. "Heh, _rahpe druhg_ ," he recited in a ridiculous foreign accent. Genis laughed even harder, even though the elf didn't know what he was laughing at. "I mean, _come on!_ "

"Yeah," Genis agreed in-between chortles, "looks like a mentally challenged five-year-old drew that."

"Desians are so lame," Lloyd snickered. He carefully put the picture back up and took out a sharpie from his back pocket, determined to elaborate on the picture with some artistic license. He stopped suddenly, pulling back with a frown. "Goddess, I'm not… not… _that ugly,_ am I?" He wondered aloud, his voice becoming small and strangely sensitive.

Genis was thankfully able to resist the opportunity to be sarcastic. He settled for changing the subject, however, since he wasn't able to say anything else without sarcasm: "They got your hair all wrong! It's all misshapen and… wrong." He cocked his head to the side and studied the picture intently.

Lloyd gasped when he discovered Genis was totally right. "What fuckers!" Lloyd growled and went to work on the poster with vigor.

"You know, I almost think someone _insane_ with genius had to have drawn this, because I'm starting to see… something extraordinary… and I think there's…" He's eyes widened in horror. "They… drew… infinity in your… hair… how is this possible? My god! Lloyd! _No!_ Noooo! Don't draw on that thing!"

But it was too late.

The Desians had placed a funny little wanted poster of Lloyd Irving which gave the impression that Lloyd was a country bumpkin with bad teeth and horrible taste in hair. The only thing it managed to get accurate about him was his bad fashion sense, which Lloyd happily ignored and instead drew facial hair and a unibrow over the picture, in addition to a yarmulke.

He stepped back to admire his work while Genis silently mourned the potential horrible beauty he'd glimpsed only briefly in the poster-Lloyd's strange hair. "Hah! See! I'm neither Jewish _nor_ would I ever, ever grow facial hair! These jerks won't know what hit 'em."

"Whatever, Lloyd," Genis sighed. "Let's just leave now, before somebody spots us. I don't feel like doing witty banter today."

"Well, okay, I guess if you're not feeling well," Lloyd replied, shrugging and pocketing the sharpie. "You're usually up for witty banter, though."

"Meh."

And just as Genis and Lloyd were about to head their merry ways out of the city, wouldn't ya know it, a couple of Desians spotted them!

"Hey!" The leader of the small group of three Desians cried and cracked his whip at the teens. "You there!"

"Don't you jerks have something better to do?" Genis snapped. "Like whipping some _inferior beings?_ "

"Yeah," Lloyd snarled, fists clenched, "or drawing _shitty wanted posters?_ "

The Desians ignored those two comments and glanced repeatedly between the vandalized wanted poster and the red-clad moron in front of them. "Say, boss, doesn't this kid look like the kid in the wanted poster a lot?"

"Yeah," the boss agreed, flexing his whip once more. "I'd say it does… a great deal!"

"What?" Lloyd gasped, hands fluttering to his hair and face. "No! That thing is hideous! How could I—"

"It's the spitting image!" The third Desian piped up.

" _Are you assholes_ _ **blind**_ _?_ " Lloyd growled through clenched teeth. "I mean, in _**addition**_ to being _**ugly?**_ "

Genis nudged the furious Lloyd in the boot with his elfy foot. "Just kill them already, we've gotta go!"

"No, wait," the first Desian said, leaning in and squinting at the poster and looking back to the red-clad moron. "Naw, this poster's got a yarmulke. That kid doesn't even look like he's had his bar mitzvah yet."

"Huh," the boss said, shrugging. "Well, I guess, nevermind then. You kids can go!" He waved happily and prepared to trot of with his two evil minions. But it was, of course, far too late.

"Too late," Lloyd vowed and rushed forward, swords coming out of their sheaths almost on their own. The Desians hardly had the chance to defend as Lloyd swept through them in a rage that was almost beautiful in its swiftness, and they hit the ground, all decapitated and dismembered, all dead.

Genis took one glance at the carnage before wrinkling his nose and getting out of Lloyd's way.

Lloyd kicked the Desian corpses around a bit and muttered to himself, cackling here and there about the mangled and dismembered corpses (while of course the tan, turbaned citizens of Triet had the decency to make themselves scarce). He sheathed his bloody swords and immediately sought out a shiny surface to check his hair out in.

"Genis," Lloyd frowned, "I don't… I don't really look like that poster, do I? I mean, Desians are full of shit, but…"

"But what?" Genis rolled his eyes. "Get over it. It was a grossly inaccurate representation of you. Big deal."

Lloyd sniffled back a few tears and then grabbed Genis by the shirt, shaking the boy back and forth. "A-am I pretty? Tell me I'm _pretty!_ "

"Wha-?"

"Nevermind. I just… ugh," he groaned as he released the elf and began fussily fixing his hair. "Stupid Desians, comparing me to that hideous, oafish portrait! _Oafish I say!_ GRAAAGH!"

"Whatever you say," Genis agreed apprehensively and backed away…

…Right into another Desian! Oh no! The monkey-helmeted half-elf gave an evil smirk and Genis gave a womanly shriek and ran for cover behind Lloyd, who'd forgotten all about mooning over his gorgeous hair and was back in fully-ready-to-slaughter mode. He growled like an animal at the sight of the Desian and began whimpering when four other Desians stood right behind him. He then decided that trademark sociopathic rage wasn't going to do much good at this point, since it had all been misspent on the three dickheads earlier. It was time for a new tactic called "deadpan."

"What do you guys want?" Lloyd demanded flatly. He kicked Genis out from behind him, probably less because he needed Genis' help than because he hated it when Genis tried using him as a meat shield. Nobody did that to Lloyd Irving! Lloyd Irving was _only_ allowed to use other people as a meat shield, _not_ the other way around. He swore, the world was a _madhouse_!

"We're just here to totally arrest you for killing those Desians earlier," the Desian replied nonchalantly, jabbing a thumb towards the dismembered Desian corpses from before. You didn't forget them, did you?

Lloyd folded his arms and oozed nonchalance. "You can't prove I did that."

"I watched you kill them," one of the Desians (this one had a crossbow) said dryly.

"One eye-witness doesn't mean much," Lloyd's suspenders defended.

"We all saw it," the Desians said in unison. "Plus," their leader added, "you were cackling while you dismembered them. There was definitely a lot of cackling involved. So, we heard it too."

"Wait, wait, wait," Genis interjected, holding a hand up in the air, "wait a minute. We saw two different fights, then. I mean, Lloyd totally murdered those guys in broad daylight but—"

"—allegedly," Lloyd snippily interjected with a ghetto-snap of his fingers.

"—allegedly murdered those Desians in broad daylight, to which there were numerous witnesses…"

"Thanks."

"But there was definitely no cackling involved during the murder itself. It was distinctly _after_ the murder," Genis pointed out.

The Desians rolled their eyes and the one female spearman of the group of four snorted. "What, so you're saying we were watching _some other_ moron in red fight?"

"You may as well have been," Genis told them quite seriously, "if you can't get your facts straight. The devil is in the details, as my sister always said! Details often can mean the difference between life or death."

"You," the Desian leader pouted, then kicked Genis in the elven shin, "shut up. You're short. Big people are talking. Anyway, we saw Lloyd kill those Desians."

"Who is this _Lloyd?_ " Lloyd blinked innocently. "My name is… Floyd Firving! I don't know what you're talking about. This Lloyd sounds like a handsome stranger who is definitely not me."

The Desian spearman snorted again. "Of course, yes, it all makes sense!"

"Of course it does!" Lloyd cried in triumph. "Because you are all fools! I mean, you're all, uh, smart Desian… dudes… and one dudette…"

"I was being sarcastic," she sneered.

"Don't bother," Genis told her as he rubbed his shin in pain. "You may as well be pissing in the wind, using sarcasm on him. It just doesn't work. Believe me, I've tried, by my thetans have I tried, but it just doesn't work."

Lloyd leaned in closely to the Desians and whispered, "speaking of pissing, don't go drinking the oasis water, okay?" The spearman scrunched her nose in disgust and the others just sighed and rolled their eyes.

Twenty minutes later, after the four Desians had been arguing with Genis and Lloyd about the exact goings-on of the fight that had occurred later, the spearman finally had her breaking point. "That's it!" She growled and chucked her spear like a javelin at Lloyd's head; because she was a woman, and also because Lloyd is a main character, she missed by an inch. "You're _Lloyd Goddamn Irving_ and stop trying to hide it!"

"No _ooooo_ oo," Lloyd emphasized, holding up his hands innocently, "because Lloyd Irving has a Jewy-McJew-hat-thing—"

"Yarmulke," Genis instinctively corrected, for which he was punished by a fist to the face and a kick to the shin by the Desians.

"—and facial hair, and bad teeth, and _disgusting_ hair!"

"Fascinating, geometrically impossible, non-Euclidean hair," Genis murmured dreamily from the ground, where he now lay, because he was too lazy to get up and face the potential that he'd say something that would make Lloyd punch him again, or the Desian kick him again.

"SHUT UP!" The spearman raged.

"Hey, PMS, put a pipe in it," one of the whip masters snapped and the spearman quietly fumed, sending imaginary daggers at everyone around her.

"It's just," she pouted, and then sighed. "We're wasting so much time here! I could've been shoe-shopping right now."

"I'm so magnanimous," their leader announced, "I'm not even going to touch that one. I find it interesting that you've even lasted _this_ long under these circumstances, though. Usually one or more of us has gone insane by this point – I mean, twenty _minutes?_ Arguing with an inferior being? It's amazing, isn't it? Why haven't we cracked? Is our new training regimen to blame? Was it the dastardly cookies we ate earlier, or the evil soirées we always throw?"

The Desians murmured amongst themselves at this valid point. "Sir," the one with the crossbow offered, "why haven't we killed him yet?"

"More to the point," Lloyd interrupted suddenly, as his attention span had run out of room, "the lack of your deaths is _depressing_." His swords leapt out of their sheaths and he glared at the four Desians, his inherent Iselian psychopathy finally kicking in, as his 'faithful' elven companion readied a lightning spell. "So, I'm gonna kill you guys, and see if it makes me happy!"

And so they did. And it made Lloyd very happy.

Where there were only three dismembered Desian corpses in the middle of a Triet market street, there were now seven. And Lloyd hadn't been too badly injured in the fight, so he happily danced amongst their remains for a good ten minutes while the townspeople hid inside their homes and Genis went to "acquire" more apple and lemon gels, since he had nothing better to do while Lloyd went into his victory-spaz attack, as once Lloyd began the victory-mambo, there was absolutely no stopping him. It went from awful start to awful finish.

But the scene Genis returned to was not Lloyd finishing up his jig of triumph, as Genis expected, but rather an unconscious Lloyd surrounded by the same guys that had attacked the Martel Temple. Genis knew this, because of this:

"Goddamn, Dave, you have terrible aim."

"Shut up! Go cry in the corner, you pansy!"

Corner-crying.

Genis sighed and thought about the best way to approach the situation, but he needn't have bothered – Dave had already spotted him with his superior eyesight and two Desians had accosted the little elven boy before he had a chance to finish his line of angsting.

"Nooooooo _ooooooooooo!_ " Was the cry as Genis and the unconscious Lloyd were lugged out of the city by the nefarious Desians over their shoulders like a sack of potatoes – the Desians, who were nefariously cackling as they went.

An hour later, Lloyd still hadn't woken up, and while this normally would've made Genis happy, this was the one in a million chance where it did not. If Lloyd couldn't wake up to go homicidal on the Desians, where would they be? Genis couldn't survive jail as an elf. He was too elfy. It just wouldn't happen. He and human ranches were un-mix-y things! He tried to explain this to his monkey-helmeted captors, but they just agreed to disagree.

"Aw, come on!" Genis whined in his best I'm-helpless voice. "I'm not worth it! I won't even tell anyone you took Lloyd! You'll totally never, ever see me again. Promise, promise, promise! Just let me _goooooooooo_ …"

"Why are we kidnapping these stupid kids again?" The Desian known as Dave wondered aloud. "This can't be worth it, it just can't!"

The Desian carrying Lloyd laughed. "I'm not going to question Botta's dress, are you?"

And they all had a good laugh at that. Even Genis, who remembered the Desian Botta's dress. It _was_ rather amusing. And somewhere within his office, Botta probably sneezed or something.

The Desians trudged across the desert with the children slung over their shoulders and eventually, somehow, Genis stopped talking. It was truly a miracle, as Dave exclaimed.

It was an uneventful trip, except for the one moment where Lloyd regained consciousness and thought he'd been stuck in Planet of the Apes because of the strange blurry monkey-helmets surrounding him. The Desians shut him rightfully up with a conk to the head.

Genis had never seen the Desian base that the Desians took him to and figured this was just the Triet Ranch, although he'd never heard of a Triet Ranch. He was brave enough to chalk most of his confusion up to the new levels of dehydration he was experiencing all over again being dragged across the desert. Again.

The base was huge, ominous, and absolutely ostentatious in every way – it was also strangely circular, for no apparent reason other than aesthetic appeal. It was noticeably high-tech, or noticeable if you were remotely half-conscious, which Genis and Lloyd (definitely Lloyd) were not.

Upon arrival at the base, the Desian carrying Genis unceremoniously dumped the little elf on the ground flat on his butt. Genis stared up blearily at the Desian Dave, wondering what would become of him, and Dave merely smirked.

"Tell you what," Dave began, "I'll make you a deal… we let you go, because you're a kinsman, and because you only whined for about half the journey… we take all your gald with us."

"B-but Lloyd sp-spent it all on the fortune teller," Genis nervously confessed, rubbing his pale, malnourished magician's hands together.

Dave groaned and stamped his foot. "Damn that thieving gypsy! Well, then, be off with you."

Genis was startled, to say the least. "Uh, hey, thanks Dave."

"No prob. Run, kid. Forget you saw us."

"No, thanks, you kinda a cool guy."

"I totally know."

And so it was that the Desians viciously kidnapped Lloyd Irving without warning, and Genis had nothing to do with any of it all, ever, in the history of ever. If pressed, Genis would confess that he didn't remember anything about the incident really, only that it was really anticlimactic, other than the brief thrill he experienced at Lloyd's sudden absence. The elf had a twinge of happiness as he imagined that if Lloyd were next to him now and hearing the things he was thinking, the idiot would probably be brutally punching him … and Lloyd was not. Genis was punch-free. He had finally been liberated from Lloyd's presence. It made him glad for the first time since this whole mess began!

And yet... at what cost?


	5. Scene 5:  A Cubic Hamburger

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Genis' happiness is short-lived when he is forced to launch a rescue mission to save Lloyd, and in the process ends up being mistaken for a cthnonian annelid by a certain blonde someone. Meanwhile, back the Hall of Justice, a mysterious man wants a latte . . .

SCENE 5: A CUBIC HAMBURGER

To say Genis the elf was happy wasn't enough – Genis was absolutely elated. He literally could not remember being more elated in his entire life. His whole being was enveloped in absolute elation – that was how happy he was.

At the cost of possibly Lloyd's life, Genis finally had a chance to build some self-esteem – Lloyd getting viciously kidnapped (and Genis didn't have anything to do with that, nor would he know anything about that) was easily the best thing that had ever happened to the little boy. The fact that Lloyd used to be his best friend wasn't enough – Lloyd had been a constant presence in Genis' life because Genis knew that Lloyd, despite his irritating, frustrating, homicidal, and often mind-exploding tendencies – as suicidal as they made Genis – were compensated by Lloyd's overwhelming ability to kill things that tried to kill him. The only reason Genis had ever really been friends with Lloyd was because of the protection Lloyd offered.

 _Okay, well, maybe that wasn't everything,_ Genis would admit silently to himself, and never aloud. He did sometimes enjoy joking around with Lloyd and playing pranks with the guy, and they did have a lot of fun inside jokes, but at the end of the day Genis figured it just wasn't worth it because frankly Lloyd was abusive. Genis knew it was all Dirk's fault (and Frank's fault too, somehow) but he couldn't in good conscience let Lloyd off the hook entirely.

And who knew? Maybe getting tortured by the Desians would be _fun!_

The only thing left for Genis to do was to convince Noishe of all of this, and the silly mint-colored dog just wasn't getting it.

"This isn't that hard of a concept to understand," Genis told the stupid beast. Noishe whined in response and began howling at the absence of his beloved owner Lloyd. Genis didn't understand this, because he apparently never bothered to learn dog-speak. What a sad, sad little ignorant boy.

"It's just not worth it, Noishe," Genis told the beast again, this time more firmly. He stamped his foot down a couple of times just to emphasize his point. "I know you want to do a rescue mission, but—dammit, Noishe, stop whining!" He cried as the Noishe started whining and running in circles. Genis, ever the silly elf, chased him.

After Genis was done chasing Noishe (he eventually just gave up) he began to wonder at his own reasoning. Noishe was whining because he missed Lloyd, but did Genis miss Lloyd? "Easy," he huffed to himself, "long version: no. Short version, the _hell_ no! Lloyd can screw himself. This is what he gets for punching me all those long years."

 _Whine whine whine hoooooooowl!_ Noishe ran in more circles.

To say it was annoying wasn't enough – it was absolutely infuriating. Genis could literally not remember being more irritated in his whole life, not even when Lloyd was around. His' whole being was enveloped in absolute irritation. Sadly, Noishe was just slightly more annoying than Genis was happy, and something had to give.

"NOISHE! If we go and rescue Lloyd, will you shut up?"

_Dog-noises! Approval Sounds! Whine! Howl!_

"I'm going to assume that's a yes," Genis sighed plaintively, "because if it's not, I'm cooking you for dinner." Then Genis actually thought about this. "Wait a second, you're a dumb animal!"

_Whine._

"And I'm a magical elf-boy. We can't just barge into a base full of mean meathead Desians and rescue Lloyd."

_Howl!_

"I mean, what are the odds that all the Desians are as dumb as Dave?" Genis mused aloud, pacing in the desert sand in front of Noishe, back and forth, back and forth. "I guess we have no choice, Noishe, and I don't relish it . . . we _have_ to find Colette. And by proxy my sister," he added with a wince. "Ugh, this isn't going to be pretty."

_More Howling!_

"Noishe!" Genis screamed, clutching his silver head. "Will you shut the **hell** up!"

It took several excruciating hours, trudging through the desert (on Noishe's back) to reach the ruins of Old Triet. Genis wasn't entirely sure that was where Colette and her adult friends were since he had no idea of how much time had been wasted cheating the fortune teller, killing Desians, grafittiing Desian posters, and getting captured by Desians . . . but he was sure that was where the Fire Seal was, and _that_ was where his Chosen friend was going to be. Genis passed the time by whining about his predicament to a deaf audience, since having to trudge through the desert three goddamn times really sucked.

It paid off in the end, however, when soon, at the edge of the horizon, hidden in a wavering heat wave was the Chosen and her two companions. Genis took a deep breath, put on his game face, and starting to fake-cry.

"WAAAAAAAAGH" was his pathetic crocodile cry, arms flailing in the air behind him, as he ran towards the silly blonde Chosen and his psychotic older sister and their equally psychotic mercenary friend.

"Oh noes!" Colette shrieked and pointed. She jumped up and down and squealed in abject terror. "It's a Sand Worm, adult friends!"

"What dares threaten my investment?" Kratos roared and charged protectively in front of the blonde Chosen to slay the fiend that dared endanger what was going to pay for his next vacation.

Raine had two eyes and saw that it wasn't a Sand Worm, but something else that was possibly just as bad, depending on your point of view. "No, wait," Raine said dully, "that's just my little brother Genis, though I can see why Colette might want to confuse him for a chthonian annelid."

Kratos squinted at the miniscule figure that was rapidly approaching the trio, wailing at the top of its lungs, and clapped his hands in front of the blond girl harshly as punishment. " _Idiot Chosen!_ " He hissed. Colette wailed. "That's an elven child, not a Sand Worm." That's when he brought out the big, insulting guns: "The myopia you disgrace by calling optics, Chosen One, is less than ideal and frankly sub-par."

Poor Colette winced and squealed like a child, clutching her Chosen ears in pain. "No, no, _no_ , Mr. Kratos! Not the big words," she sobbed out pathetically.

"Nevermind," he muttered and folded his purple arms huffily. _I hate my life,_ he thought.

Raine extended her arms obligingly and Genis ran into them, sobbing like a chthonian annel—I mean a Mongolian blood worm that missed its big sister. Genis sobbed fitfully, clutching the woman's brown teacherly robes and spilling big crocodile tears all over them before Raine Sage had enough of those antics and slapped the boy silly. And spanked him. And kicked him in the teeth. And drained him of his four humors. And dismembered him. And some other things.

Colette cloud-gazed and Kratos filed his nails while Raine went about her usual routine of abuse for the next few minutes. By the time she was done, Genis was a goopy pile of black bile on the ground, Kratos' nails were fine points, Noishe had meandered his way towards Colette, and Colette was playing fetch-the-chakram with the dumb animal (whom apparently Colette could understand, since she had the sense to learn dog-speak, unlike butt-monkey Genis).

"First aid," the Professor finally could be bothered to utter, and _SHA-ZAM_ , just like Captain Marvel but with less super powers, her little brother was as good as new.

_Magic, Mothafuckas!_

"Genis!" Colette cried happily, skipping over to her emotionally scarred childhood friend. She wrapped the poor elf in a bone-crushing hug. "I made a goof – I thought you were a Sand Worm! Tee hee, I'm silly. Kratos nearly killed you!"

"Nearly," the Man Himself muttered, admiring his nails.

Genis shoved the blond Chosen off uncomfortably. "Whatever. Look, there's some stuff I have to tell you about, but first, you should probably know it was all Frank's fault. Maybe Dirk's fault too, but mostly Frank's."

"Yes, yes, Colette's father is an excellent scapegoat," Raine rushed, "now explain to me why you're not in Iselia where I left you . . . preferably before I pay Mr. Aurion fifty gald to dismember you, Genis."

Genis looked at the mercenary and gulped. "Kratos wouldn't do that to a poor little kid . . . would he?"

Kratos, having heard his name and the mention of money, looked between the people and the strange fur-cow that were present, and hrmphed. "Which one's Genis again?"

Genis shook off the feeling of foreboding and remembered the point. "Right, right, so listen, Iselia's gone. Desians . . . Desians burned the place to the ground and the Mayor exiled me and Lloyd. They totally kidnapped Lloyd when I wasn't looking while we were in Triet. Everything that has happened so far had nothing to do with me and everything to do with Lloyd. And Frank. But I want it abundantly clear that it was, in no way, associated with me, or a strange booger-raptor named Marble. Oh, also, you should know – Lloyd's stupidity is contagious. We found that out by accident. Don't ask." Genis shook his head sadly as he remembered _that_ incident. Stupid, stupid Lloyd. "Also, Iselia went poof in a blaze of fire," Genis reminded, "that's the most important thing to take away from all this."

Colette gasped in shock, Raine gasped in delighted surprise, and Kratos sort of stared off into space. "Arson on that kid of scale would up our property value!" Raine cried happily. "Think of the benefits!"

The blonde girl gasped in shame and despair. "Professo _oooo_ r!" She whined in a tone she had clearly learned from Lloyd, "how can you be so callous? What about all those poor dead people? How could you forget about them!"

Raine's shoulders went up and down in a shrug. "I don't know, pot?"

Genis gasped. " _Raine_!"

"What? Oh, whatever, you're old enough now to know – your sister's a pothead," the Professor sighed. "How else would I deal with you little bastards all these years?" Raine sighed again and added a sniffle to the affair, totally oblivious to the shocked stares around her. "Too bad I left my stash back in Iselia . . . probably the only thing I regret about that town. And now it's all burnt to crisp! Such a shame. My only consolation is that we get the money."

"Not to mention resale value once the new house is rebuilt," Kratos commented, and the two adults nodded in approval. "With the population decreased by the Desian raid, the neighborhood watch association along with the homeowner's association burnt to a healthy crisp, the majority of the town's eyesores set on fire," he went on clinically, "and not to mention the Chosen's journey having just begun with all the world-saving and tourist benefits that it will bring, Iselia's future is looking bright and prosperous."

"You're absolutely right, Kratos," Raine agreed, nodding along. "I don't know how I could forget all that. Your mind is shrewd and a valuable asset."

"Of course it is," he assured arrogantly.

"But- but, the poor people," Colette whimpered.

Genis reached his quota for being an impotent rage and at that moment, he felt like setting fire to some inferior beings. At that moment, Genis understood Desian mentality perfectly. It was a temporary, fleeting feeling, but it shook him nevertheless. "Well," the elf continued, trying to stifle his murderous impulses, "that wasn't even the, uh, best part. The Desian leader's, the guy that attacked Lloyd and everyone and shit, his name was . . . and are you guys ready for this?" They nodded eagerly, and Genis took a deep breath. "The Desian Grand Cardinal of Iselia's name . . . is _**Forcystus**_."

"For—Forcystus?" Raine repeated dumbly.

"Forcystus," Kratos repeated, less dumbly.

"Forcyswha?" Colette repeated adorably, but also very dumbly.

"Forcystus," Genis nodded. "Yep."

A brief moment of silence swept across the sand dunes before they began to shake and quiver with raucous, obnoxious laughter. The wanton laughter continued for a good few minutes until all the four companions and Noishe were bent over with pain from all the funny, tears in their eyes. Even Kratos couldn't contain himself.

"A-a-and then Lloyd," Genis stuttered, trying to hold it in, but broke out into laughter once more. "Lloyd was all, Lloyd was all . . . guyslisten _thispart's_ _ **realfunny**_ ok Lloyd was all, ' _Why didn't you just name yourself SYPHILIS! SAVE YOU THE TROUBLE!'_ " The four doubled over in laughter once more and Colette even fell to the ground, rolling in the sand she was giggling so hard.

"No, no, no more," Kratos finally managed out in between bouts of girlish giggles, "no more, _I'm pissing myself_! _Hahahahaha!_ "

After a good half-hour of uproarious laughter they finally managed to get their bearings back together.

"I don't get it," Colette announced, clearly baffled.

They ignored her.

"Funny names aside," Raine demurred, "this is a serious issue. You said they kidnapped Lloyd, or is that wishful thinking?"

Genis struggled to recall, he was still dazed by the funniness of Forcystus' idiotic, venereal name. "Maybe a little bit of both, sis?"

She smacked him but nodded nonetheless. "That's fair, I have often wished atrocities on that boy . . . but he has his uses. We should rescue him. If not for the virtue of rescuing his helpless ass than because he owes me money."

 _Whine! Dog-howling! Noises! More whining! Plus a Howl!_ _Whimper, whimper, Kratos is threatening me, Whimper!_

"Also, that," Raine gestured coolly to the beast named Noishe's antics, "since he apparently won't shut up about it and Lloyd seems to calm him down." The two 'rational' adults nodded in serious agreement, Colette did a little jig or something and Genis contemplated the horrors of recent events. Except for the absence of one red lobster, it was fairly routine.

Stupid Noishe, making Genis' sad life all the sadder. The junior elf sighed and wished his new-found self-esteem a goodbye and fond farewell, for he would likely never see it again as long as he lived. His only real consolation was that this turn of events proved there was no God or Goddess and that Genis had been correct in his raging atheism all along, because no manner of deity would ever inflict such unending horrors.

Meanwhile, far away from Genis' atheist angst, Lloyd was puzzled.

Lloyd woke up to a cold and empty cell on a clean but lumpy cot. He looked around him for something that would address the what-the-hell of the moment, but there was no such thing. The walls were gray bland, made of some kind of metal that Lloyd wasn't familiar with. He sat up, a little too quickly as he got a head rush, and moaned a bit in despair before ignoring his headache and looking around the room.

"Huh," was about all he had to say.

He hadn't been here five seconds ago. "Where am I?" He asked no one in particular. "Last thing I remember is Planet of the Apes, and then . . ."

"Just because our helmets are dorky," a new deep voice said, which Lloyd jumped at, "doesn't mean we're monkeys, dammit."

The voice was from a Desian outside Lloyd's cell. The cell's locking mechanism, which was reasonably high-tech, prevented Lloyd from getting any closer to the Desian to get a better look (the teen's eyes were reasonably blurry at that moment) due to some kind of electrical fence. Lloyd realized that he'd been captured, but moreover, he had an epiphany: "Oh, My, GODDESS," Lloyd cried, clutching his head in disbelief. "I've been sent to the future!"

"Ah shit," the Desian deadpanned.

"The distant future where the Desians rule everything and we're all a bunch of stupid, dirty dystopian apes!" Lloyd got down to his knees and raised his fists to the ceiling and bellowed melodramatically, "NYYOOOOOOOOOOOO _OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!"_

"Elven Jesus," the Desian guard – whose name was incidentally Dave – marveled, " _hate_ my job." Then he slapped himself on the helmeted forehead as something else dawned on him: "Well slap my back and call me Botta! I coulda had a V8!"

Once Lloyd finished up his bitchfit, he decided that he didn't like being captive and needed to get out of the dirty, ape-filled, futuristic Desian prison he'd been taken to. "I can't believe these assholes are still around in the future," Lloyd muttered darkly, "I mean, come on! Wasn't Colette supposed to take care of these jerks on her sparkly Journey of Awesome? If she's still around in the future, I'm gonna give her a piece of my mind."

Lloyd noted that while his clothing was still mostly intact, his gear and all his weapons weren't on his person. The only thing they hadn't confiscated was the ring on his finger – the Sorcerer's Ring, his saving grace. Grinning like a maniac, he knew exactly what he had to do.

He waited until his head was clear and his eyesight wasn't blurry and then stepped up to the bars of his cell. The locking mechanism wasn't pickable, but it was breakable, and Lloyd really liked breaking stuff. Especially people. He grinned at his guard and carefully aimed his fist.

"Hey, you, Desian dude," he called out.

'Desian' Dave glanced over in a bored fashion. "What is it, kid? I'm a little busy."

Lloyd frowned. He hadn't anticipated this! Oh no! "Well . . . you don't _look_ busy."

Dave looked around nervously. "Shit, I don't? Uh oh! That's the only part of the job is looking busy! Quick, quick!" He modeled a bit in front of Lloyd, looking menacing and threatening. "How does this look? Better? Am I busy-looking yet?"

Lloyd was impressed. The 'Desian' looked a bit threatening. It was really a vast improvement, this change in demeanor. "Yeah, man, I'm kinda scared."

Dave beamed. "Really?"

"Well not when you're smiling like a dork but yeah, I'm thinking any more of this . . . I might just piss myself a little."

"You're too kind."

"Yeah, I – wait a minute!" Lloyd slapped himself, realizing he'd forgotten a V8 as well, but also something else: "What am I thinking! You're a Desian from the future! I'm not scared of you, you're just a big fat asshole!"

"This isn't the future, dude," Dave said blandly, but knew in his heart that the kid wasn't going to listen.

"DESIAN LIES!" Lloyd hollered. "Taste the wrath of my ring of power!" He aimed the gem on his fist at the Desian in front of him, who was very much unimpressed, and let loose a jetstream of flame.

It was more than Lloyd expected. Last time back in the Martel Temple, when Lloyd had first acquired the ring, all it had done was spout little bursts of lame magic. It had been pretty cool, but this was something else entirely. The Sorcerer's Ring was now a flamethrower. Where once the 'Desian' Dave stood now there was a piece of half-elven toast.

Lloyd stared at the ring on his hand in awe, careful not to aim the volatile magic at his face. "I am," he began softly, slowly, in awe of the magnificence of the Sorcerer's Ring, "LORD SAURON!" He shrieked, raising his fist at the ceiling. The ring let loose a beam of white-hot firepower that seared the ceiling in two with the same force that it had cooked Dave.

"D'oh!" Lloyd cried as the ceiling of his cell totally started to collapse on him. He aimed the ring at his cell's locking mechanism and it was soon nothing but a pile of molten . . . metallic . . . alloy or something, I don't fucking know.

Meanwhile, Lloyd's would-be rescuers were bogged down by witty banter and Genis' short legs.

"Genis," Raine said sternly, "if you don't hurry those stumpy legs up I'm gonna have to chop them off."

"Wouldn't that be counterproductive, Professor?" Colette wondered smartly.

Everyone but Kratos was too startled by Colette's smartness, so: "We could always simply tie the monkey to Noishe and go at our own pace."

"Excellent idea," Raine said, once she was able to speak again after Colette's outburst. "Monkey-brother-of-mine, get over here!"

"I'm not a monkey," Genis muttered and for the first time ever, he wished that Lloyd were there. Lloyd would at least have thought up of something more stupid than tying him up to Noishe and chopping his legs off. Lloyd also probably would've punched him, but maybe, just maybe, the punch was worth it based off of the treatment he was getting in his friend's absence. Nonetheless, he shuffled over to his abusive sister.

Meanwhile, back at the Hall of Justice…

"WHERE AM I? WHERE DID ALL THE DESIANS GO? AM I IN ANOTHER DIMENSION? IS _THAT_ WHERE THAT MYSTICAL DOOR LED ME TOO AND THE FLASHING LIGHTS AND PRETTY PONIES? SYLPH, WHERE'S THE FREAKING DOOR OUT OF THIS STUPID PLACE? WHY IS EVERYTHING BACKWARDS? AND WHAT _**DA FUCK IZZAT THING?**_ IS IT LIKE A CUBULAR HAMBURGER? LIKE A METAL HAMBURGER? LIKE, FOOD, BUT IN THE SHAPE OF A WEIRD FLOATING BOX? IS THE FOOD IN _SIDE_ OF THE BOX? WHY ARE THERE _SPARKS_ COMING OUT OF IT? HOLY SHIT, IS THERE PIZZA _IN_ THE BOX? _WHY_ CAN'T IT BE A HAMBURGER! I AM SO DAMN HUNGRY! THAT'S IT, I'm EATING the METAL CUBE, and I don't even _CARE_ if it isn't a hamburger! Just like Dad taught me: Dwarven vow number three-hundred-and-one, why the hell not!"

Five minutes later:

" _IIIIIIIIIII'M THIIIIIIIIIIIIRSTY!_ "

Five minutes later:

" _IIIIIIIIII'M HUUUUUUNGRY AGAAAAAAAAAAIN!"_

Five minutes later (15 minutes since consumption of metal cube):

" _IIIIIIIIII'M HOOOOOOORNY!_ "

A good hour later, an hour filled with crying, sobbing, and a few things that are too terrible for decent imagination, Lloyd realized that the reason he couldn't find his way out of the strange place he was in was because he was _inside the cube the whole time!_ [Twilight Zone music]

No, really.

Lloyd, feeling rejuvenated by the consumption of the strange metal Desian device he'd discovered, backtracked and followed down a different series of hallways. "One of these has to lead out of this place!" He said to himself optimistically as he trotted merrily through the Ranch.

It did occur to him that it was odd, how no Desians since Dave were getting in the way of his swords (which he'd found just laying around irresponsibly – honestly, were these Desians even _trying_?). Lloyd, of course, reasoned that it was because they had all be hiding inside the cube Lloyd had eaten and were trapped now in a scary hell-dimension inside Lloyd's stomach. This made perfect sense, especially since Professor Sage had at one point in Lloyd's life, told the kid flat-out, "there must be a miniature hell-dimension in your stomach, and that's how you eat so much."

Sadly, this amazing theory was disproven as two Desian guards emerged from behind the corner of a hallway Lloyd was in. The lobster froze in place held his hands up to his face and screamed, running in circles while the confused Desians just stood around like morons. After Lloyd was done, Lloyd killed them, and began the victory-dance.

By the time the victory-mambo was done, Lloyd was sated and took off down the nearest hallway and into the nearest door, justifying this turn of events in his mind as in total compliance with a variation of Dwarven Vow Number 301: fuck it! (This was, of course, the same vow that told him to eat the large Desian device from earlier. Just making sure you're keepin' up with your Vows!)

Lloyd burst into the nearest room and eyed it appreciatively. The decorating was terrible but it had a bit of a feng shui feel to it. Not that Lloyd would ever admit to knowing anything about feng shui. Furthermore, shut up. _This is an awesome place to hide,_ he thought, and grinned as he rushed over to the nearest desk to duck under it, only to find . . .

"AH!" Lloyd shrieked like a woman. "Stranger danger! _Stranger danger!_ "

Behind the desk, where Lloyd hadn't seen because he's stupid or something, lurked a blue-haired man in a cape!

"And just who the hell are you?" The clearly annoyed blue-haired man and his cape snarled.

Lloyd could only stare. "Why are you wearing a carpet?"

"It's a cape," the man stated blandly. He held his hand up and a ball of mesmerizing blue lightning formed, which sent Lloyd into immediate hypnosis. "You have five seconds to tell me who the hell you are and to get out of my office, or my lightning-hand is going to shock the shit out of you."

"Pre-tty," Lloyd stuttered, staring into the swirling vortex of electricity. "Pre-tty . . . space peo-ple . . . and da pup-py . . ."

The blue-haired man, who was slightly intelligent, realized the problem and closed the magical vortex in his hand. Lloyd snapped to immediately.

Unfortunately, the first thing to come out Lloyd's mouth was, "and who're you to ask for my name, bitch?"

"Oh, you did _not_ just go there," the cape-man spat, green eyes viciously narrowing.

"Oh, I went there!" Lloyd snapped his fingers, ghetto-style. "I went there, bought the T-shirt, and sent you a postcard! That's right."

And it was just at that moment that a certain Brit in a dress arrived upon the scene.

"Botta!" The blue-haired man exclaimed angrily. "Where the **hell** is my latte?"

"Sorry, sir," the pyramid-headed man apologized, "but there's been a delay. I mean I had to belay that order. The Chosen and her group have infiltrated the base."

"That's no excuse for forgetting my latte, you lackey, you," snapped Mr. Cape.

Lloyd, suddenly 'realizing' why the pyramid-haired man looked so familiar, pointed and gasped in recognition. "Hey! I know you! You're that dick in the dress! The Brit that killed all those priests!"

The two 'Desians' stared at the red-clad creature, looked at each other, and then said in unison, "Moron." Cape-man turned to address Botta. "I don't care what you have to do, Botta, but you're getting me that latte and you're going to get it right goddamn _now_."

"But, sir," Botta's dress complained, " _Kratos_ is with them!"

"Fuck," Cape-man stated, clearly surprised. He rubbed his clean-shaven chin pensively. "And it didn't occur to you to report this to me sooner, why?"

"I tried to, back when you ordered me to get you a latte," Lord Botta the Brit explained, shifting from foot to booted foot uncomfortably. Lloyd eyed the exchange with interest. "You wouldn't listen and I thought it would be better if we just kept quiet and got you your coffee; maybe it would put you in a better mood to listen to my report. By that time, Kratos was already infiltrating the base and the coffee machine mysteriously disappeared."

"What do you mean, 'disappeared'?" Cape-man and his fabulous hair demanded. "That was a piece of highly advanced machinery, that was. It doesn't just disappear. That thing can play videogames _and_ make espresso. It's heavy as hell, so it's not possible someone could've just moved it around a bit and wing-paks aren't authorized to this base!"

Botta shrugged. "I don't know, sir, but it's gone."

"It's ginormous!" Cape-man roared, throwing his arms up in the air in fit of caffeine-deprived rage. "It's a gigantic, sparking, metallic cube! How could it just—"

"Oh, _THAT_ thing?" Lloyd interjected, happy to know what was going on for once. "I thought it was a hamburger and ate it."

The two Desians stared at the lobster in uncomprehending horror and fascination. "You . . . ate . . . what?" the Brit stuttered.

Lloyd nodded happily and patted his belly. "Yup. Yum yum. For a piece of metal machinery, it was very delicious. Or maybe I was just too hungry to care, I dunno, but either way, that thing is down its way out my digestive track now."

"You . . . ate my GameCube Mr. Coffee?" The blue-haired Desian leader shouted in disbelief. The look on his face was a mix of confusion and terrible fascination.

Lloyd nodded. "Yeah, I don't know about GameWhatchits and Coffee Hoodigs but I ate that big metal cube. Like an hour ago."

" . . . How?"

"I can eat anything," Lloyd said easily enough, and they all accepted this.

IT was then that shit started getting serious. An explosion of a kind rocked the base and the two Desian leaders shared a glance. "Well," said the bluenette, "I have to bounce and I suppose you know why."

The Brit's head bobbed up and down in understanding. "Your identity cannot be compromised, Lord Yuan Ka-Fai!"

Yuan Ka-Fai stared at Botta in disgust, whacked the Brit on his sissy head and fled the scene. But not before he could get in one last witty one-liner – as he was about to escape out the door that Lloyd had arrived in, he turned back to the half-boy-half-lobster-all-Dwarf and said, menacingly: "That GameCube Coffee Maker is worth more your weight in flesh, kid. So the next time we meet, Lloyd _Irving_? _**You're mine.**_ "

Lloyd stared at Yuan with eyes as wide as dinner plates and raised an accusing finger shakily at the Caped Crusader in pure, undisguised terror. "Rape," he hissed, and then went into full freak-out mode, running in circles like a chicken with its head cut off. "RAPE! I NEED AN ADULT! RAPE! RAAAAPE! _**RAAAAAAAAAAAAPE!!**_ "

Lord Yuan Ka-Fai shook his head in disgust, whapped his subordinate upside the head one more time for good measure, and left.

The Chosen One, sensing the impending peril of her LI's virginity, rushed to save the day.

"Lloyd!" She shrieked, causing everyone in the vicinity to bleed from the ears. She and her posse arrived from behind a previously unseen door into Lord Yuan Coffee's—I mean, Ka-Fai's office. "Llooo _ooooo_ ooyd! Lloy—Oof!"

And of course, Colette fell right flat on her chosen face.

Lloyd and Genis, now reunited, took a good few seconds to laugh at this. "Bahahaha!" They pointed and oh, how they laughed. "You suck, Colette!"

Colette sniffled and held back a few tears, no longer feeling such an urge to help Lloyd (also, he wasn't in any immediate danger anymore). Kratos eventually helped her onto her feet and she was left unscathed, except for her slightly hurt puppy-feelings.

Botta, meanwhile, was left in his one-armed dress with his funky hair in a room full of Chosentards and sociopathic villagers plus one very frightening 'mercenary,' all of whom wanted him dead.

"Uh," Botta began, and the four would-be heroes looked up at him expectantly.

"Yes?" Kratos answered for the group, folding his arms and sending the Brit one of his famous pants-shitting glares. Botta, who had no pants on, did not shit himself, but a brick did coincidentally fall out of his skirts at that moment.

" . . . Let's compromise," Botta suggested. "You already kicked Vidarr's nasty ass and I ran away like a little girl. So how about I do that again, I surrender my weapon, and run out of here in a most humiliating fashion."

Kratos thought about this. He looked to the teenagers for any suggestions and they shrugged, so he shrugged. "I'll tell you what, I'm feeling generous. I'll give you to the count of three to leave all your belongings on the ground in front of me and start running. After that, I'm going to sic the Chosen on you."

They all nearly laughed at this, until Colette got a very strange gleam in her eye that they'd never seen before. She looked a Botta almost . . . threateningly. "Were you the one who tried to rape my Lloydie?" She wondered innocently. Or not so innocently?

"No, I—"

"Yeah, Colette, that's totally the guy!" Lloyd nodded along, already having forgotten entirely about a certain Ka-Fai, the magnificent cubic hamburger, and Planet of the Apes. Botta sighed, knowing it was all pointless.

"It's pointless, just go with it," Genis suggested, in case Botta wasn't getting it yet.

"One," Kratos began cruelly, and Botta started stripping.

He was out of that office in the blink of eye, before Colette could even remember what was going on. As soon as the Brit fled the scene she started counting the tiles on the ground and when that failed, she began to pick dandruff out of Lloyd's hair.

"That was really anticlimactic," Genis stated needlessly and went to retrieve Botta's belongings.

"I can't believe you guys came for me," Lloyd said, dumbfounded. "Why'd you do that?"

"Lloyd Irving!" A familiar, cringe-inspiring voice. Lloyd cringed a bit.

"Oh, man, you guys brought _her?_ " He pouted.

Raine arrived somewhat behind schedule with fury in her blue eyes. "Lloyd, you owe me money, young man!"

Lloyd sighed and knew the beating was coming. He barely had time to brace himself for it before Raine started a-kickin'.

A few minutes later everybody somehow, someway, managed to get their shit together and head on out of the base. Lloyd wouldn't shut up about his implausible adventures in the base while the others were trying to rescue him. Colette babbled about clouds in the sky. Genis tried to commit suicide by pissing off his older sister and Raine counted the number of ways she could hurt her little brother. Kratos acted enigmatic and spooky, consequently scaring all those present.

Botta, in case you forgot, was busy screaming and running around the Desian base naked, just like a good lunatic.

Everything was pretty much routine.

Except when Colette told Lloyd about the Fire Seal all the way across the goddamn desert on the other side of Triet, and Lloyd heard about how he'd have to traipse _all the way_ through the desert fucking _again_ , he started to scream and cry. The only thing worse than crossing the desert three times for no apparent reason was crossing it more than three times. And when that bitching failed to appease the obviously fake trickster desert gods, he glared down at his unappreciated elven best friend and socked the boy silly. "I'll be damned if I can't find a way to blame this on you!"

All the while, sitting at the edge of the universe in quiet contemplation of its mysteries, a bearded man-sage nodded and smiled to himself as he knew that everything was right again, and as it should be.


	6. Scene 6:  A Sexy Ruin

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Professor Raine commandeers an Exsphere (with a fancy Key Crest and everything) and highly disturbs the rest of the Chosen Posse by her violent reaction to the Triet Ruins; Kratos discovers a new source of entertainment, and also some boobs.

SCENE 6: A SEXY RUIN

"So," Raine began conversationally, holding up a shiny bauble she'd pilfered from Botta's gear that the Desian had abandoned in his nekkid lunacy, "is this pretty pebble one of those fancy-shmancy Exspheres I've heard so much hype about?"

"Yeah," Lloyd nodded, "they're all the rage with the young. Check out my bling, yo." He stuck out his right hand for everyone to ooh and ah over.

Genis felt like adding something: "I use Marble's with that Key Crest that Lloyd's Dad made for her. They're pretty useful with spells and they make you super strong. But you seriously cannot use them without a Key Crest, or—"

Raine punished her little brother for interrupting with back-hand to the face. Genis started crying. Everyone ignored him. "Someone less whiny explain this to me," she demanded, "and by that I mean Kratos."

"Exspheres without Key Crests are the Beatles without Lennon," Kratos obliged enigmatically. Lloyd was unable to place it, but he swore something was familiar about this explanation. "Without attaching a Key Crest, the Exsphere becomes a parasite, or an 'Ono'," the mercenary emphasized with finger-quotes, "as the dwarves call them, which feeds upon the life-force of the user. This turns them into monsters if the stone is removed, and slowly drains them of anything resembling humanity if they don't. A vicious cycle. The only way to escape it is with a Key Crest, or by getting shot in the head by a madman."

The children in the room shuddered from Kratos' presence. Raine, as an adult, seemed unaffected by the mercenary's gloomy aura and nodded, diving into one of her packs and pulling out all the random treasures she'd collected over the many years. She was, apparently, a hoarder, or had been a dragon in her past life, as they all shortly had to leave the area for fear of drowning in Raine's endless sea of shiny artifacts. The Chosen briefly went into a comatose state for an overload of shiny things. However, none of them were able to explain how Raine had transported all of the objects without any of them noticing, but Genis did point out that Noishe had a limp now, whereas he hadn't had one before.

They had retreated to the shitty Inn in Triet, and upon arrival Lloyd had cheerily informed everyone that he'd pissed in the Oasis water just a day before – of course, he'd said this only right after they'd taken a bath and had dinner with said water. The Professor properly punished him for this.

Eventually Raine managed to yank out what appeared to be a rusty Key Crest, and how she got it, no one will ever know. She threw it at Lloyd's head and demanded that he fix it, or she would _destroy_ him.

"You hear me?" She growled, pulling her student up by the suspenders and glaring intently into his startled brown eyes. Ice met fire. Somewhere, a volcano erupted. "I will _kill_ you."

"Well . . ." Lloyd mock-thought-about-it and plucked himself from Raine's pale graspers. ". . .Okay. I'll make you a Key-thing. Just give me a little bit, you don't wanna see what'll happen if I half-ass this shit."

And so he did. Five hours later. Raine properly punished him for this. Genis was just happy that the attention was finally off of him for a change.

After buying supplies and dealing with Colette's clinical inability to stand up straight for long periods of time and thus crashing into people, puppies, and churches, they made their angry, frustrated (spooky, in Kratos' case) way to the Fire Seal. Lloyd was very, very upset about having to trek through the desert once more but his complaining was silenced by one of Kratos' bloodshot glares.

Upon arriving at the Fire Seal with surprisingly little incident (only one monster had attacked, and made the fatal mistake of getting drool in Lloyd's hair), the next thing they knew was a horrifying sound that wrenched the universe in twain.

It came from the throat of Professor Sage.

Raine _squealed._

There wasn't another word for it, the terrifying squirrel-shriek that came out of her mouth. It was a squeal that reached into decibels even bats would find obnoxious. Unable to cope with the sound, Lloyd screamed and began running around in circles yodeling while Genis and Colette quietly bled from the ears. Kratos, unperturbed, filed his nails.

"Feel the _smooth surface! This is polycarbonate, from the ancient war!_ "

"Oh yeah!" The Chosen giggled, clapping her hands, utterly ignoring the audible crucifixion they had all just experienced. "They have those on all the Seal doors, to um, you know, protect against _maaaagic._ "

The furious Professor hurled her staff at the Chosen's blond, bubbly head. Colette had a no skills with which to dodge and so was hit square in the forehead, falling over with the clunk of a stack of bricks. " _SILENCE,_ _ **WORM**_ _!_ " Raine screamed, and somewhere, a burning lidless eye atop a tower flinched. _"I DID NOT BID YOU TO SPEAK!_ "

Colette frowned and stood up, succumbed to peer pressure, and ran in circles with Lloyd shouting about bat-noises.

Eventually Kratos could be bothered enough to toe the children in line and they managed, somehow, to pry Raine off of her precious ruin and tie her up with rope near the entrance.

"Does she have a fetish for ruins or something?" Kratos had to ask as he tied Raine's knots tighter, causing the ruin-crazed woman to whimper slightly.

Lloyd nodded, feeling a little disturbed. "She tries to act all sly about it in class but we know what she's done! I saw her with that war cannon! I-I can't . . . I can't talk about it . . . the therapist said I shouldn't."

The white-haired schoolteacher struggled violently against her restraints, twisting her body in a desperate effort to escape. She howled and roared, and somewhere a ring-wearing invisible midget cringed. How dare these imbeciles deprive her of her beautiful ruins! She _had_ to study it! She had to! " _NO, MY SEXY RUIN!_ _ **GIVE ME BACK MY PRECIOUS RUIN YOU ARTIFACT-STEALING FIENDS!**_ _I'LL PAY YOU WHATEVER YOU WANT! I'LL GIVE YOU_ _ **DOUBLE**_ _! HOW_ DARE _YOU DEFY ME? DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA WHO I AM? I AM RAINE SAGE, OWNER OF BALA—_ "

Everyone ignored her, wisely. Genis, a slightly intelligent person with elf eyes, noticed a suspicious plaque in front of the Fire Seal's magnificent polycarbonate door. It was engraved with mysterious angelic script and had a hand print on it with several arrows pointing towards the hand. He wondered what it could possibly mean.

"Hey, Colette!" He called over. Colette ran over to the elf-boy, only tripping once in the process.

"What's this thing?" He gestured to the pedestal with the plaque.

"Hmm . . ." The Chosen's brow furrowed up cutely in intense concentration. She traced the angelic sigils with her index finger. "It says, 'Discount Grills at Triet's Appliance Warehouse! Buy one, get one half-off! Deal ends shortly!'" She revealed.

Genis frowned. "Then why does it have a handprint on it?"

Colette ignored him, clapping her hands in glee. "Wow, I always wanted a grill! We should go there. Hey, hey Mr. Kratos! Triet has discount grills!"

Kratos grunted vaguely, having gone back to filing his nails. It got Lloyd's attention, though, who forgot about why he was yelling in circles and rushed over like a little girl at her birthday party. "Really? Oh, _sweet!_ We can have an outdoor grill in the desert! I can make you guys some of my Dad's famous Dwarven Chipotle. Oh wait, I need mithril for that." Lloyd wondered where he could find a quarter-pound of the legendary metal this time of year, but then shrugged. "Screw it, I'll just make a desert hamburger. The only weird ingredient I need for that is cobra poison and this desert is _full_ of bloodthirsty cobras!"

Colette nodded happily, fantasizing about hamburgers. Even Genis appeared to consider this idea.

"Holy Martel on a pogo-stick! What's this?" Lloyd cried and rushed over to a nearly identical stone to the one Genis discovered, only this one was not a grill advertisement.

"Oh, this is the Oracle Stone!" Colette informed. She read the engraved angelic script. "It says, 'Place Chosen Hand Here!'"

"Cool!" Lloyd grinned and grabbed Colette's Chosen Hand, slapping it down on the plaque before anyone could stop him.

"Wait," Genis rationalized, "maybe we shouldn't—"

Genis' warnings went unheeded as always. The instant Colette's palm made contact with the marvelous Oracle Stone, the polycarbonate door at the entrance to the sand-buried Fire Seal slid open with an earth-shaking thud revealing a cavernous and perilous dungeon beneath. Everyone went into silence – even Raine had stopped yelling about ruins, and Kratos finally started paying attention.

Lloyd, after a few seconds of deliberation, grinned. "Now to catch us a Fire Seal!"

Genis looked up at his tall friend and sighed. "You do know there isn't actually a seal made of fire in there, right?"

"Shut up, atheist."

"Really? We're still doing this?"

Lloyd punched him.

Raine was untied and Kratos led the expedition into the Fire Seal with the Chosen and her posse close at his heels, for they knew that whatever they faced, their mercenary friend was fully prepared to deal with it with his swallow-tail cape, his scary face, and extreme upper-arm strength.

None of them were prepared for what truly lay in there, though.

Several hours later, the five heroes looked back upon the mess they had made and blanched in horror, except for Lloyd, who was strangely reserved about the whole thing, and Kratos, who had no reaction other than his normal mysterious silence. Raine threw up in her mouth a little and Colette barfed all over Genis' elven head, and Genis, covered in Chosen-barf, cursed the world under his breath.

Their gory, circuitous journey to and through the Fire Seal had been momentous, to say the least. The scene behind them was indescribable, inscrutable, and all those other large words that start with the letter 'I'. A cadre of undead fire elementals, three hundred kegs of Asgard's finest, assorted corpses in various states of manglement, and an inexplicable series of lava streams (and were those dead puppies hanging from the ceiling?) behind them, the heroes turned to each other, each with the shared knowledge of what had just transpired. Try as they might, they all knew that short of faking their own death, destroying the fire Temple, assuming a new identity and leaving all of Sylvarant behind to reside in a hermitage in the woods for the remainder of their days, there was nothing that could ever or would ever make them forget the Fire Seal. This horror would outlast them by millennia.

Raine was the first to regain the ability to speak, since they had all been suffused in terrified silence. "W-we will never speak of this again. The horrors we have wrought in this lair of despair are for none to know."

Everyone paused, taking this in. Lloyd shook his head sadly. "It was like a Michael Bay movie back there. You know what I mean, right Colette?"

"The poor puppies," Colette managed, her entire body wracking with sobs but stopped crying when Raine fixed her with the evil eye.

"Can we all agree on this?" The Professor asked, eyeing each and every one of them seriously.

They all nodded. "Agreed," Kratos rumbled.

And off they went on their not-so-merry way into the main chambers of the Fire Seal, where either a seal made of fire was, or some kind of lame mystical hoodig.

Lloyd was very disappointed to find it was the latter. He'd been fantasizing about having a pet seal made of fire that he could train to catch rabbits, but he'd just have to make do with his faithful green dog-fish-horse Noishe.

Luckily for Lloyd, his trek across the desert was not to be unrewarded. Instead of a seal made of fire, there was a giant red cat with spikes made of fire.

"Aww," Lloyd cooed, offering a red-gloved hand towards the pretty kitty. "Here, kitty kitty!"

The cat bit Lloyd's hand off. He cried in pain, clutching his bloody stump. " **Bad kitty!** " He yowled, glaring at the mean cat.

Raine lazily waved her staff of healing in Lloyd's general direction and Kratos chopped the beast's head off like a French noble on Guillotine Friday, and that was the end of that.

Or was it?

"More angry kitties!" Genis gasped, pointing towards two _floating_ cats made of fire. The rational part of Genis' brain wanted to know why the cats were floating, but that rational part was squished by the glory that is this:

" _ **Yaaaaaaaar!**_ " Lloyd roared, channeling Frank, and charged the angry cats, swords blazing.

They bit both his hands off and snickered about it. Lloyd sobbed. Genis began a slow clap, reveling in the fact that for a few moments Lloyd had no fists with which to punch him. Kratos killed the mean kitties, Colette tripped on her face, and Raine eventually got around to healing Lloyd. The boy's pride, however, was not something so easily healed, but nobody cared.

"Elf senses tingling!" Genis cried out.

Raine frowned. "I sense it too. It's a shame, I was about to punish you for making up elf-nonsense again, but I suppose that punishment will have to wait."

In the center of the room where the fire-cat corpses were congregated lay a stone altar made of volcanic rock. As soon as Kratos ended the lives of the mean hand-biting fire-kitties, the altar glowed an eerie red and the form of a red-skinned floating demon without legs appeared ever so briefly. The surrounding mana swiftly swallowed the diaphanous form whole.

Colette, with the chipper ease of the deranged skipped to the altar, clasped her hands in front of her, and began to pray.

"Goddess Martel," she implored reverently, "great nurturer of the heaven and the earth, I ask that thee grant me thy strength!"

"Wow," Genis whispered to Lloyd, "that was almost profound."

"I know," Lloyd nodded, eyes wide, "I didn't know Colette knew about big words like 'thee' and 'thy.'"

"This is such a surprise," the boy affirmed. "I-I am so surprised."

"Me too, man."

A big, bright, shiny light flooded the room quite suddenly and an angelic chorus started from on high. Kratos coughed and muttered something about showoffs again, which made Genis frown.

" **Is this thing on? Is it on? Hey, can you losers hear me down there?** "

"Yeah," Lloyd shouted, grinning moronically and giving two-thumbs way up, "we losers can hear ya loud and clear!"

" **That's great, that's great.** " The bright light faded and there was no one standing in the room. Colette peeked one eye open, confused at the absence of the angel Remiel, who was supposed to deliver her some angel-powers. " **So, listen, my wire is stuck and I can't get down, but pretend that I'm totally there, 'kay?** "

"Okay." Colette nodded cheerfully. She was very good at playing the pretend-game!

"Wait," Lloyd interrupted and pointed accusingly at the ceiling where Remiel's angelic voice came from, "you're an angel – you don't need wires, you have wings, right? We've all seen the wings."

"I haven't yet," Raine announced and raised her hand. "I, for one, would very much like to see the wings."

" **Yeah, but shut up,** " Remiel said eloquently and everyone did so. " **Anyway** ," the angel of _fucking_ judgment (angel of Disco only if papa's got a brand new bag) went on, his angelic voice filling the room with sweet, sonorous arrogance, " **You're doing a great job of this Chosen Journey of Woe and Betrayal, Chosen One! Who knows, I may give you nice kids the key to the Tower.** "

"Really?" Everyone but Colette and Kratos aahed.

" **I said 'may,** '" Remiel's effeminate voice seemingly glared at them. " **I see you found your way to the Fire Seal, committed a few crimes against nature, raped some ruins and awoke the Summon Spirit. Everything is five-by-five. Here's some angel power.** "

A shiny stream of magic goo came from virtually nowhere and attached itself to Colette's neck with a sickening squelch. The Chosen winced ever so briefly, quickly disguising the pain with a blissful smile. "Thank you, my Lord. I-I mean, my father."

Remiel snorted. " **Sure thing, girlie. Don't freak out if you get hit by a wild case of the flu in the next few seconds – it's Chosen flu, so it's not contagious.** "

"Is Chosen flu like regular flu?" Lloyd queried intelligently. "Is she gonna be barfing all over the place? Because that is _gross_ , Colette."

Remiel's voice ignored him." **Like I said, it's a special kind of flu. Namely, it's just a symptom of becoming perfect, like me! Your angel-daddy! Now you folks get the hell out, because I gotta sort out this silly wire fiasco. I swear to Goddess Charlie it's these immigrants, they don't know how to work the f** —" Remiel suddenly cut off as if his microphone suddenly died, or since the Sylvarantians were unfamiliar with such technology, it sounded as if he had simply disappeared mid-sentence like the end to a Sopranos episode.

"That was weird," Genis commented, voicing all of their opinions.

"You know, I'm kinda glad he wasn't here in person," said Lloyd, who was finding the bright side in all this. "I was _not_ looking forward to seeing another dude in drag. Between that carpet-wearing Desian, the one-sleeved Desian, Kratos, and this joker, I've had my fill of those."

"Shame," Raine muttered, leaning on her staff. "Seeing real wings on an angel would have been fascinating…"

"Then you're in luck," Kratos told her wryly, "because it seems Colette has now developed wings of her own."

"What?"

They all turned, double-taking comically in the process as Colette, still prostrated before the basaltic altar had a pair of translucent pink sparkly wings sprouting from her back. They fluttered gently in the air, as if they were privy to some invisible angel-wind. A tingling of their elf-senses told Raine and Genis that the wings were made of pure mana, and although it was unclear whether or not Colette was now capable of flight, the shininess and the sparkly-ness was enough to put logical thoughts out of everyone's minds.

"Holy _shit!_ " Lloyd squealed, jumping up and down in the dwarven jig of excitement, taught to him by his mad dwarven father. "Holy shit, holy shit, holy shit, Colette, this is the coolest thing you've ever done!"

"Unholy Science, Colette!" Genis squealed much more nerdily, jumping up and down with his main character buddy.

"Buh-but I didn't do anything," she murmured, and then noted that she had shiny wings on her back. Their shininess caused her to faint momentarily.

" _I MUST STUDY THEM_!" Raine cried right on cue and got out her dissection tools. It was only by Kratos' intervention that the world did not end that day by Chosen-vivisection.

"No," the mercenary said simply and held the crazed woman back, who began to shriek and howl again like back at the entrance to the fire seal, making everyone wish for a timely suicide. While she screamed, somewhere, a white tree in a courtyard of stone withered away into dust.

While Genis and Lloyd freaked the _fuck_ out about the wings and Colette was at a loss for words, they eventually meandered their way from the sweltering dungeon back out into the sweltering desert.

"I've seen things you people wouldn't believe," Lloyd announced gravely, kneeling in the sand and grasping handfuls, watching it pour through his fingers, "Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched c-beams glitter in the dark near Tanhauser Gate. All those moments will be lost in time like tears in rain. Time to die—"

Raine knocked him on the head with her staff. "Be quiet, Lloyd."

Lloyd's mind reeled, searching for a reference he could cling to. "It would take more than a man to lead the slaves from bondage. It would take a god!"

"Lloyd," Colette cajoled softly, "no one will get that one."

He sniffled pitifully, standing back up. "You get it though, right Colette?"

She smiled beatifically. "Of course, Mr. Heston!"

"You're awesome, Colette," Lloyd grinned and went to hug his friend, who nearly had a heart attack from joy. It was to be spoiled, however, by a sudden crippling illness. Just as Colette was about to achieve her LI's attention, she fell forward, knocking Lloyd in the head and collapsing in the hot sand like a stack of pretty bricks.

"Oww!" Lloyd groaned, clutching his throbbing forehead. "Oh, wait to go Colette! You're such a freaking ditz, I can't believe you crash into me like that! I thought we were friends. You . . . Colette? Colette!" He knelt back down and began to jostle her back and forth like a sack of featherweight bricks when she wouldn't respond. She seemed to be paralyzed or just too weak to move, because she let him violently shake her like a baby. "Colette! Get back up! This is no time for a nap, we're in the middle of the _goddamn_ desert I'm not done criticizing you for being so damn clumsy! Look, I have a list!" He reached into one of his bottomless dwarf pockets and pulled out a rolled-up laundry list of all of Colette's faults.

Colette reacted like a brick would, which is to say she was in no state to respond and Kratos came to the rescue, as he often did when on Retard Patrol. "Leave her be, Lloyd," he ordered, "she's suffering the trials of the Chosen One."

"Huh?"

"Remiel mentioned that she'd get sick," Genis recalled and helped the mercenary to pry Lloyd off of Colette's prone form.

Lloyd's eyes widened in realization. And then narrowed. "Great! Now who am I going to criticize?"

Genis, ever the pitiful elf, ducked out of the way so Lloyd wouldn't have to answer that.

Meanwhile: " _RELEASE ME AT ONCE! I MUST GO TO MY RUINS! I COMMAND YOU! WHY AREN'T YOU LISTENING TO ME? HAS EVERYONE GONE_ _MAD_ _? WHY ARE YOU WALKING AWAY? NO! THE RUINS! TAKE ME BAAAAACK TO THE RUINS! TAKE ME BACK! I DIDN'T HAVE ENOUGH TIME TO STUDY! NOOOOOOOOOOo_ _ **oooooo**_ oo _!"_

* * *

Lloyd and Kratos set up a camp in the shadow of the Fire Seal while Genis made dinner and Raine struggled against her restraints. Sometime during the night Raine calmed down and asked politely why she was tied up, evidently having no memory of her stint as a lunatic. Kratos released her and she returned to normal, and that was that.

Colette woke up shortly after that and went off to angst by an nearby oasis, which was odd, as the only oasis nearby was the Triet one; nobody wanted to tell her, but it was all a visual trick by the tricky trickster desert gods designed to confuse the Chosen and lead her astray.

Eventually Lloyd approached her, pulling out the list of Colette's faults that he was about to read off, but when he caught the look on his differently-abled friend's face, he put it away, having a very rare moment of doubt. "Colette, are you okay? Don't tell me you need company or something."

"No, I'm fine," she lied. "You can go back to camp, it's all right."

Lloyd wiped imaginary sweat off his brow. "Whew! Good, 'cause I'm bad at comforting stuff. Killing stuff, now that's different." He paused, a manic smile of glee moving across his face as he fantasized about killing Desians for a few moments. Then he shook it off. "Anyway, if you're still feeling sick, walk it off like a man!"

Colette frowned. "Buh-but I'm a girl!"

"Well, yeah," Lloyd guffawed, "but you're Colette. Psshaw. Anyway, have fun staring emptily at this fake oasis, I'm going to enjoy this extra tasty soup Genis made."

Colette frowned harder, apparently unable to form tears and stared at the fake oasis, not understanding what Lloyd meant by 'fake.' She squinted her eye shut several times, rubbing at them, trying to cry, but was physically unable to do so. She sighed and kicked at the sand. "What's happening to me?" She muttered.

Raine popped up from virtually nowhere with a grin, causing Colette to jump and scream in fright. "It's puberty, dear," the schoolteacher informed. "You're going through the changes which will make you into a woman! It's a natural and beautiful process, full of magic and adulthood. Soon you'll develop pimples, breasts, and then for a few days a month you'll become an emotional wreck as you experience bleeding in strange places, terrible pain, and an unsatisfied libido!"

Colette glanced down, noting that she actually had a semblance of boobs all of a sudden. She gasped in delight. "Does that mean…? Lloyd will finally _notice me?_ "

"No."

No matter how hard she squinted or threw sand into her eyes, Colette was unable to cry.

Back in the camp, Lloyd was having the shit-fit of the ages over the revelation that Genis' delicious soup had _tofu_ in it. Can you _believe_ that? Oh my _Goddess._ "Tofu is _not_ an approved staple of the Dwarven diet!" He insisted, throwing the bowl of soup into the distance.

"Whatever Lloyd," Genis shrugged it off and continued sipping at the delicious tofu soup. He knew that Lloyd would come around, and sure enough, Lloyd soon forgot about the tofu completely and went back to eating the soup. This time around, Genis made sure only to mention the tofu when Lloyd was done with the food, that way he'd get the satisfaction of seeing Lloyd squirm in impotent rage and experience the onset of bulimia. Genis was not a nice little elf.

Many tofu-related incidents later, Lloyd meandered over to Kratos, to see what the scary mercenary was up to. Kratos fixed Lloyd with one of his glares but Lloyd shrugged it off, being so used to them now that he was simply immune. Kratos, impressed with this development, granted Lloyd the privilege of conversation.

"So what are you doing?" the teen asked.

Kratos glanced down at the whetstone in his hand and the sword in his lap. Then he wondered how on earth Lloyd had managed to live to his current age. He pushed that thought out of his enigmatic head. "Sharpening my swords," he replied blandly.

"That sounds fun. I lied, that's boring, Kratos. You're boring. I'm gonna eat more soup." Lloyd paused. "You know, something about that soup tasted rather funny," he confessed.

"Perhaps it was the tofu," Kratos offered, expertly suppressing a smirk.

Lloyd's eyes widened as his short-term memory suffered another blow. That soup had _tofu_ in it? Can you _believe_ that? _Oh my Goddess!_ "WHAT?" He shrieked, running back towards Genis and delivering a punch to the elf express-mail. " _TOFU IS NOT AN APPROVED STAPLE OF THE DWARVEN DIET, GENIS! HOW COULD YOU?_ " He punched again, and Genis sighed in defeat. "Dwarven vow number twenty-nine: tofu is the crap of devil and not meant for num-nums!"

"It just never gets old," Raine murmured, quietly sipping at her meal as a bemused smile played at her lips. Kratos silently nodded beside her and the two adults sat back to watch the show.

* * *

The next day the motley crue (nee hee hur!) ambled their way to the Ossa Trail, which would take them to Izoold, which was someplace that filled Raine with absolute terror for an unnamed reason. Each time the word 'water' or 'boat' was mentioned, the Professor would seize up and start sucking on her thumb, curling into the fetal position. It was a mystery. Kratos, incidentally, was having a great deal of fun with this development, which is important because the enigmatic merc was offered so little in the way of amusement these days.

"So," Colette said, clapping her hands. "Why are we going to Izoold again, Mr. Kratos?"

"Because we have to get to Palmacosta, Chosen," he said patiently. "We must go by boat." Raine seized up. Kratos smirked. "Not by land, but by _sea._ " Raine began to whimper.

"Not the boats," the Professor whispered, "why do we have to go b-b-by b-b-boat? Wh-why not _walk?_ Walking is ever so much safer…"

"Because _sea-travel_ " –Raine yelped, curling into the fetal position—"is the fastest way to get to Palmacosta. And we must go to Izoold, because it is a _port_ town. There are many _ships_ there. Which is likely where we will be able to secure a _boat_ to ride in, over the _ocean_ and to Palmacosta . . ."

Each mention of anything relating to water got Raine further and further into a tizzy, slowly driving her deeper and deeper into dementia. This went on for several hours until Lloyd, of all people, had to object:

"Okay," the red-clad moron held up his hands, "okay, okay, we get it. Damn, it was funny maybe the first five hundred times but not the next five hundred. So the Professor doesn't like boat travelling, blah, blah, blah, but this is getting really old—"

"No it's not," Genis insisted, a wide grin plastered on his elven face, "this is the most karmic satisfaction I've had since you got kidnapped by Desians!"

Lloyd glared at the little elf. "I'mma pretend I didn't hear that. Anyway, it's just—"

Kratos snorted dryly. "Well forgive me for being highly amused—"

" _ **BOOBS!**_ " Lloyd suddenly cried out, stopping dead in his tracks with eyes as wide as plates.

"What?" They all started. Colette looked down, crossing her arms over her chest.

"No, no—boobies," Lloyd insisted, pointing dead ahead where sure enough, there were titties. Everyone froze, even the women – they were unable to tear their eyes away from the stunning sight before them.

A set of DD-cups, in the middle of everyone's argument, had jumped down from the rocky cliff in front of them and flopped softly onto the green grass with a gentle jiggle, along with a black-haired foreigner in purple clothing attached to them. Everything went silent for a few moments until the olive-skinned girl, clearly flustered, spoke up.

"Is the Chosen of Mana among you?" The girl and her boobs asked loudly, a card deck in her hands.

Lloyd was unable to form a coherent sentence, so Colette spoke up, raising her hand into the air like a good student. "Ooh! Ooh! Pick me! That's me, I'm the Chosen! Tee hee!"

"Colette," Genis groaned, kicking his sister out of her stupor so she could get ready to heal them, if the need for it arose in the next few seconds.

The black-haired girl fidgeted briefly before scowling and dropping into a battle stance with her poker cards. "Prepare to die!" She growled and charged.

Everything appeared to happen in slow motion. According to Kratos, it was actually all very fast, but to everyone else's crazy, inferior, drug-riddled brains it only _appeared_ to happen extremely slow. The purple-clothed, heavily boobed assassin charged for the frail Chosen who, in response, began to – in slow-motion, mind you – fall backwards as she tripped in surprise over utterly nothing. Genis and Raine eyed the whole thing with sadistic glee while Lloyd was still unable to move, torn between an inability to tear his eyes away from the assassin's mesmerizing chest and his undying need to kill. Kratos was pushing the red-clad moron away and charging for his investment, but had a fleeting moment of internal debate where he wondered if he would still get paid if he just told everyone that Colette had failed in her trials as a Chosen and it was in no way his fault.

All the while, Colette fell, and fell, and fell, until she hit the ground. Like a brick. And like a brick with arms that tries to catch its fall, Colette's arms flapped backwards and tried to brace herself but failed clumsily and instead latched on to a conveniently located lever, which caused a bowling ball to fall from a nearby tree, which rolled on a ramp to hit a mechanism that hit a guinea pig in a cage that ran in a wheel which opened up a trap door right underneath the assassin's feet.

One second the girl was there, and the next she wasn't, her surprised cry echoing up and out of the hole she'd fallen down.

Naturally, everyone was devastated.

"Oh no!" Colette shouted, crawling over to the hole and staring down it. "Guys I think I killed her! Uh-oh, uh-oh, uh-oh! I made a goof!"

"Idiot Chosen," Kratos growled, displacing his inaction on Colette's ineptitude, as usual.

"Damn it all!" Raine swore under his breath. "I thought she would succeed! Then there would be no reason for us to go to Izoold."

"NO!" Lloyd screamed. Oh, the horror! "No, NO! The boobs! Colette, what did you do!"

"I-I'm sorry?" Colette was actually unsure if she was sorry about this, as she looked down at her own chest and felt a twinge of jealousy. She shook and hit the side of her golden head repeatedly, knocking those thoughts of her head like pepper from a shaker. Those weren't very Chosen-like thoughts! Shame, shame!

Lloyd cocked is head to the side, a thought occurring to him. "I gotta say though, Colette, props for dramatic timing. That was classic. I wonder what this trap door is even doing here?"

"It's a mining passage," the Professor informed everyone, but nobody cared.

"Considering that girl's weight and the velocity and everything," Genis spoke up, working out the math in his head, "that fall probably wasn't fatal. Unless this hole goes to the center of the earth. Then she's totally dead. But . . . it probably doesn't do that."

"Really?" Colette and Lloyd spoke in unison. Lloyd frowned. "Wait, Genis, that doesn't seem right."

Genis thought about it and aha'd when he realized the problem. "oh, right! I forgot to take in the weight of her chest. Well, still, it probably wasn't fatal, but it must've hurt a _lot._ "

" _Good,_ " the inner sadist in the Professor cackled madly, rubbing her hands together. Everybody eyed her with mixed feelings, especially Kratos, who appeared to be uncomfortably torn about something and was doing a really good job hiding it.

"Why you are all so broken up about someone trying to kill Colette and _failing miserably,_ " the spooky mercenary reminded everyone, "is beyond me. But shut up, your retarded logic is giving me a headache."

Everyone stared at him this time with mixed looks. Some resentful, some impressed. "That was the longest sentence I've ever heard from you," said Lloyd.

Kratos whacked him on the head, because he didn't have anybody else to punish for inventing talking and Lloyd was a good enough scapegoat.

The Ossa Trail was a long and narrow mountain path riddled with bandits and monsters and other bad things. Luckily for the group they had Lloyd for entertainment, and Kratos for killing, and when they got hungry Genis was around for num-nums. After a few long instances of enjoying the scenery and nearly getting killed seven times by wild bears, the purple mercenary managed to convince everyone to pick up the pace so they could get out of there before he got impatient and murdered them all.

Eventually they reached the end of the trail and encountered a big cave covered by wooden boards. After a few moments of not caring about anything the wooden boards burst from the inside and out came a familiar pair of boobs and the clumsy assassin they were sewn to.

They all gasped in surprise. (Except for Kratos.)

Then Genis snorted in derision. "I knew this would happen."

The assassin looked a great deal flustered from her ordeal, all covered with dirt and smudge. She coughed and then raised her deck of cards threateningly. "Prepare to die!" She called out. "Um, again!"

Kratos and Lloyd looked at each other and for an incredibly rare and ever-so-brief moment, they were on the same level. The same page. The same paragraph, even. And oh, how they laughed.

"Whaddayagonna do?" Lloyd laughed, doubling over. "Give us _paper-cuts?_ "

"Oh, I'm s _ooooo_ scared," Kratos mocked.

After a few more seconds of laughing, they stared at each other in horror. "Di-did we just bond?" Lloyd whispered, afraid of the answer.

Kratos coughed lightly. "No. You are merely being dumb."

And then the assassin with the boobs, whatever her name was, charged.

It was a stupid battle, on that everyone could agree. The only people who seemed able to face the girl with the boobs without getting paper-cut like a particularly idiotic kindergartner were Raine, Colette, and Kratos. Kratos was dealing with the problem for the most part but another issue they hadn't seen coming was the assassin's accomplice – a strange floating bird-thing with a thing on its back that no one, no matter how hard they tried, could describe.

Genis and Lloyd stared, cocking their heads to the side, their mouths opening and closing like fish as they tried to come up with the words to explain things to each other.

"It's like a . . ."

"Yeah, like a . . ."

"Like a bird!"

"Yeah, with the feathers and the beak. And, uh . . ."

Lloyd pointed. "And there's _that_ thing."

"Yeah, yeah. The _thing._ " Genis used his hands to try and imitate the shape of the object, and failed."On its . . . I wanna say _back_ , but I can't tell."

"Yeah."

After a while they gave up any hopes of witty banter or mocking the bird-thing to death and Lloyd charged at it, tearing it to pieces in blind, Iselian sociopathic fury. But that was just a normal reaction. Genis, meanwhile, seemed to debate whether or not he should help out the others with the assassin.

Kratos wasn't even really trying, which was obvious to everyone. He seemed perfectly capable of taking on the assassin by himself and everyone was content to stand back and watch with popcorn. This was, of course, just frustrating the assassin even more, who, in her frustration, made a critical misstep, giving room for Kratos to end the battle with one happy stab.

"Blarg!" She jumped back, clutching her bleeding stomach more out of disbelief than pain. "Holy crap! That _really_ hurt! Is that what I've been doing to people this whole time? Oh my Goddess, that hurt like a _mother!_ "

"Yeah! Take that, girl-with-boobs," Lloyd shouted, throwing popcorn at her. The girl stared again in disbelief at the others, and then at Kratos with fearful respect. Then, apparently out of options, she rifled in a pocket for something and threw it on the ground, abruptly disappearing in a cloud of gray smoke.

They all gasped in surprise. (Even Kratos.)

Their suspended disbelief didn't last long, though. "Oh, wow!" Lloyd grinned. "That was way cooler than your wing-thing, Colette," he told his Chosen friend. She frowned and stared at her shoes dejectedly. "I wish I could teleport like that! You wanna know what I'd do if I could teleport?"

" _ **No**_ ," Professor Sage said firmly, her knuckles turning white as she clenched her staff.

Lloyd told them anyway: "I'd go around and teleport to all the Desian Grand Cardinals while they were sleeping and draw penises on all their faces!"

Genis thought about what he'd do if he could teleport. "Hmm. I think I'd fake my own death! Then, when I was at my funeral and I was watching everyone pretend to cry, I'd pop up in the coffin and scare the shit out of everyone."

Lloyd grinned, high-fiving his best friend. "Priceless."

"Oh!" Colette raised her hand, a chemical reaction in her Chosen brain causing two brain cells to bump into each other and give her an idea. "I know what I'd do if I could teleport! I'd teleport to all of the Seals, um, instead of going there by walking or by boat, 'cause teleporting would be _so_ much easier."

Lloyd nodded fervently. "Yeah, all this walking is stupid! We had to go across that damn desert like a hundred times!"

"Four times," Genis instinctively corrected, and he was of course punched for this.

"And now we're probably just going to have to take another fucking epic trek across another stupid desert to get to _another_ stupid seal." Lloyd threw his arms up in the air in frustration. "How many of those Seals are there, anyway?"

"No one knows," Colette told him cheerfully. "Could be two, could be a million! Tee hee!"

Lloyd dropped to his knees, raised his gloved fists to the sky, and roared against the world. " _ **Noooooooooooooooooo!**_ "

Kratos was erstwhile having a splitting head ache, and Raine was in the fetal position again, having going through a panic attack at the mention of the word 'boat.' He kicked her a couple of times, which fixed her right up, and then he knocked Lloyd over the head with the hilt of his sword.

"Why'd you do that?" Raine wondered as Lloyd's listless body fell to the dirt with a heavy thump.

"So I would not have to deal with _that thing_ he does."

"Oh, you mean the talking."

"Yes. _That_."

"I understand completely." She nodded sagely. Get it? It's a pun. Heh. Heh. Heh. "Sometimes I wonder what it is that keeps me from strangling that boy. I usually just overextend the bounds of corporal punishment, but other times I just huff a joint and all my worries go away."

Kratos Aurion stared at the white-haired schoolteacher. He began to understand that Raine Sage was a wise and cruel woman, but above all, she was without a doubt completely and utterly insane.

* * *

Izoold was smaller than Iselia had been, even post-Desian-rape, and reeked of fish. It was a small fishing village of little historic or strategic value and its 'citizens' were mostly drifters, sailors, pimps, and other shady characters. Raine could not be trusted with the important task of securing passage because she was mentally ill so she was sent with the children and Noishe, Lloyd's comatose form strapped to the green mystery animal, to book a room at the Inn while Kratos went to find a boat.

Kratos' quest to find a boat was long, crazy, and stocked full of woe and betrayal, but his story is for another time.

"Hey." A creepy dirty sailor shuffled from foot to foot, eyes darting to and from Genis. Genis jumped back, instantly uncomfortable. He began to understand why Lloyd's instinctive reactions to these situations was to scream 'rape' at the top of his lungs and yodel for an adult. "Hey, you, kid," the sailor repeated. "You know Aifread?"

Genis' eyes narrowed, unsure if engaging was the right thing to do. He shook his head suspiciously. "Aifread? Is that the muffin man?"

"What? Aifread killed the muffin man."

"Really? Was it sad?"

"Sorta. Aifread's this guy. He sails." The dirty man smirked. "Well, now he's gone. Tough luck finding a boat without him around!"

Genis began to stare at the man with an entirely different sense discomfort – this one rooted out of confusion and hate for the world around him. "Wait, are you just going to sit here and tell me useless things about some asshole I don't even know? Because if you are, I already have Lloyd for that. Like, all the time, every hour of every day."

The sailor's eyes bulged and he began to scream and yell. "ROLRFLORGBLORGMAARRRR!" He threw his arms up in the air, wailing and flailing and ran off, jumping into the ocean, never to be seen again.

Genis stared after the retreating form of the sailor and blinked several times. "I will never understand humans." He shook his head sadly and caught up with his psychotic sister at the Inn.

Raine greeted her little brother with a back-hand to the face. "Oh, hello Genis," she said pleasantly enough. Genis rubbed the new bruise on his face, whining like a petulant elven girl. "Go wake up Lloyd."

"Or not," he suggested.

"Point. At the very least, unload him and drag him by those stupid white tails of his in the general direction of the rooms I booked us."

Genis looked around at what was generously referred to as 'rooms.' It was one room, with six beds. "You mean, 'room?'" He corrected instinctively.

Another back-hand. "What have I said about correcting me?"

Colette raised her hand. "Oh, I know Professor! 'The Teacher is always right, and never wrong, and if you think otherwise, it's the dungeon for you!'"

"Excellent," Raine smiled and tossed the Chosen a cookie. Colette munched on it happily while Genis sulkily dragged Lloyd's body in by the white coat-tails, and then they all patiently awaited Kratos to return and give them news that he had secured passage on a boat.

The Man Himself returned a few minutes later, telling him he'd blackmailed a man named Max into giving them free passage to Palmacosta. Kratos frowned at the lack of enthusiasm in the room when he related this news. "I suppose no one cares to hear the sordid tale of how I accomplished this?"

"No," the pessimistic Sage siblings said in unison.

Later, as Colette was chasing butterflies (no one had the heart to tell her the butterflies weren't real either), Genis was sulking, and Raine was sharpening the tip of her staff into a fine point with a switchblade whilst muttering about 'water-loving cannibals,' Lloyd woke up.

"Whoa," the sworder mumbled. "What'd I miss? All I remember are boobs, smoke, and pain! Did we just come back from Jersey?"

Kratos gave out a startled shout and jumped, surprised by the sudden unfamiliar noise (he'd almost forgotten Lloyd existed) and rapped Lloyd over the head again with the hilt of his sword. The young idiot's eyes rolled back into his head where they belonged and he fell to the floor with a crack. Everyone stared for a few seconds at this development before shrugging and returning to Iselian apathy.


	7. Scene 7:  A Trivial Tarriance

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which the world is a mad, mad place.

SCENE 7:  A TRIVIAL TARRIANCE

KRATOS

It is affecting me. My sanity is beginning to slip and I am feeling the after-effects as we speak. Clinging to sense is like trying to catch wind with your hands. Incidentally, the Chosen attempted to do this several hours ago at the prow of the boat. She is still trying. I cannot find it within me to stop her. Lloyd is still blissfully unconscious, and the schoolteacher continues to sharpen the end of her staff, preparing for another round of abuse. The annoying small one is sitting in a corner, counting to three million under his breath to avoid having to think. I rationalize that it is wrong to blame them for their actions since each of them are merely trying, on some level, to cope with the world around them.

As I watch them all, I am reminded of crabs in a barrel. My former student once asked me why they kept pulling each other down, and I told him it was because they did not know better.

We are to leave towards Palmacosta. I persuaded a weakling fisherman into giving us passage, if the definition of persuasion still involves swords pointed at throats and threats of bodily harm. As brutish as the effort was, I had little patience for grace and tact after the incident in the docks was resolved. It was horrific, to say the least. Note to self: exterminate all tomatoes on sight.

All of my years have taught me that losing one's sanity is a slow process. I once encountered a hermit who lived outside of Heimdall who insisted the years had not driven him mad, but 'creatively objective.' He said this as he danced on a table, wearing nothing but a corset and jogging shorts, with a lampshade upon his head. When that idiot Yuan foolishly asked him what gave him the impression that he was anything _but_ mad, the hermit calmly countered, 'because I have no attachment to reality. Logic is the crux upon which the possible functions; when logic is removed from the equation, it follows that impossible is made real, and reality crumbles. I want nothing to do with a crumbling reality, do you?'

The tables had been turned on us. That argument should have made no sense. In a sensible world, it would've fallen apart quite easily. Unfortunately, the world does not make sense. Unfortunately, this reality is no longer sane.

Thus I pose that it is not _I_ who have gone quite mad, but the world around me. As the only sane man in the madhouse, there is nothing for me to do but play the part.

Unfortunately, that sort of principle does not work in this world, and it is because of that argument that I know that I am insane. The worst part is that I still retain enough sense to realize what is happening to me.

I had always assumed that madness would be no different than any natural state of being. It simply was. I did not think it that a madman would ever question his reality because it would not occur to his addled brain that there was anything wrong, which is what marks the sane from the insane. A paramecium has no concept of itself; it lacks the capacity to gaze up and into the eye of the curious scientist. We study it, it does not study us. It does not know that its life is little more than a blink of the eye in the macroverse. It might be aware that something is wrong, it might sense that something is amiss, but it cannot possibly understand that it is just a culture in a lab. It has nothing in the entirety of its being but a sense of foreboding. It lacks the capacity to know anything beyond its own life.

Similarly, a man looks up through the scope of the stars and seeks to contemplate the higher beings above them; they might feel as though they are being watched at times, they might sense that something in this world is amiss, but they cannot know. Whatever it is that is out there is beyond the scope of our understanding.

The greatest trick of Cruxis was in convincing this world that it was the ultimate power, and the Desians the ultimate threat. I watch Lloyd sleep, his snores loud enough to wake a dragon, and begin to doubt my purpose. Lloyd must never know who I am, that much is certain. His . . . fragile . . . _psyche_ would not survive the damage, and I am not certain I would be able to cope with the fallback. If he were to ever find out about the ties that bind us, everything would fall apart. I must spare him, even if each day I begin to doubt whether or not he deserves it. It is better this way.

"Mr. Kratos! Mr. Kratos! Mr. Kratos!"

Being mad is such a chore.

I glance up at the Chosen to indicate I am listening. Ordinarily I would glare at anyone who disturbs my thoughts, but one must not be unkind to the dying. I tell myself this each morning. It does not always sink in. To be perfectly fair, the lot of them go out of their way to irritate me.

I digress. "Mr. Kratos, look-at-a what I found!" The cheery girl shoves what appears to be a tiny starfish in my face, only I recognize it as a baby monster. How on earth the girl found one is a mystery that I want nothing to do with. I am forever comforted by the indisputable fact that I will never know what is going on inside the Chosen's head; in Sylvarant, knowledge is not power, it is fuel for blind hatred. One look at the Sage boy will tell anyone as such.

"Isn't it the c _uuuuu_ test?" She coos.

"Adorable," I deadpanned. The thing was several different shades of purple and brown, had five eyes, seven arms, and teeth the size of a monster twice its size. It was a marvel that it was not biting the Chosen's hand off. I made a mental note to kill it when she was not looking and blame it on Raine Sage, whose abuses were so varied that killing a helpless baby monster would be the least of her crimes. The harried Professor in question was now practicing jabbing unseen enemies in the air with her sharpened staff, likely attempting to ignore the fact that she was on a boat surrounded by water. Discovering that she was hydrophobic was my sole joy in this journey so far.

"I'm gonna name him Jorje!"

" . . . That's wonderful. You and Jorje should go and play in a place that is not here. For example, over there." I point in some vague direction.

"Okay!" She giggles. "I'm going to get him a bucket so Jorje can survive, and I'll feed him sugar cubes, and I'll love him forever and like him for always. Me and you are gonna have so much fun, Jorje!"

Yes. Clearly, I am mad, and the world has gone mad with me. Yuan must never find out about this development, or I would never hear the end of it. The only way I can be certain that he will never know is by pretending to be like the formerly sane Kratos that I once was. I must stifle my newfound murderous impulses by . . . killing everyone? Or is that the opposite of what I wish to do? Where once there was clarity of purpose granted from my long life, there is nothing but a dark fog of confusion.

I must find a compromise by killing all the monsters everywhere and occasionally, my teammates.

Occasionally.

* * *

"Hey Genis," Lloyd greeted, bright-eyed and full of life, like somebody who had totally not at all been knocked out several times in the last few hours by his own team-killing troupe.

Genis glanced up, startled out of his sulking. "Uh, when did you wake up?"

Lloyd's face scrunched up in confusion. "That's a weird way to greet somebody. Whatever, I'm gonna go play with Jorje."

Before Genis could ask 'who and what the hell is Jorje?' Lloyd stalked off, shouting for Colette at the top of his lungs. Genis went back to counting under his breath to avoid the act of thinking – thinking brought only despair. Lloyd was living, breathing proof of that.

Their poor terrified boatman, whose name was Max, was in a state between denial and surrealism. He refused to make eye contact with any of the posse, possessed fiercely he was by the belief that these lunatics stole your souls when you gazed into their eyes. He sailed on to Palmacosta, utterly silent, while said lunatics cavorted about him like a Broadway showing of Cats gone wrong, but without cats and less faggotry.

Raine, at one point, stabbed Max with a pike she'd fashioned from the remains of her staff. "YOU ARE AN OCEAN FULL OF FISHY _LIES_ ," was her battle cry. And while it was certainly amusing to watch the wild-eyed educator (who at this point had mentally regressed into a cavewoman) brutally murder an innocent man with reckless abandon, Kratos had to ruin the party by informing everybody that he didn't know how to sail a boat didn't trust anybody else to try. So it was that the mercenary saved poor, terrified Max from the brink of stabbity Raine-death.

Let it be noted that the above was not an isolated incident and repeated itself at least seven documented times. Eventually, everyone got tired of Raine's murderous hydrophobia and Lloyd knocked her out with her own staff, which everyone agreed was ironic.

The instant Max's fishing boat docked at the port town of Palmacosta, the fisherman promptly dropped off his crazed blackmailers/passengers and left, shouting after him for everyone to fuck themselves, especially the crazy bitch with the spear. Genis zapped him with a lightning bolt in the ass by "accident."

"Palmacosta!" Lloyd cried, kneeling down on the grimy, gross docks and kissing the ground while his teammates looked on, disgusted by the unsanitary display. "We made it! The long journey is over."

"We should restock while we are in town," said the party pooper. "Chosen, drag Ms. Sage to the nearest Inn."

"Okay!" Colette agreed easily enough. "I'll go help her book some rooms, 'cause she's unconscious, so it'd be super hard for her to do all by her lonesome!"

"How shockingly observant of you," he noted. "I was going to suggest that you simply abandon her there while we left town in a hurry, but your suggestion works for our idiom as well. Penis, ensure that the Chosen doesn't wander off," Kratos ordered and Genis scowled. "Lloyd, come with me."

"I don't know." Lloyd frowned. "That sounds boring."

"I must have failed to mention that we're going to buy swords," Kratos said dryly.

" _Swords?_ AWESOME, I LOVE THOSE THINGS!" Lloyd shrieked like a little boy on Christmas and jumped up and down, clapping. Colette grabbed the Professor's lifeless form by the coattails and dragged her away, grunting under the weight. Genis followed his blonde friend, eager to be away from Lloyd and the authoritative mercenary.

"Doo dee doo dee doo," Colette sung to herself, off-key, as she trounced around with the Sage siblings in tow – one of them literally, in tow. Genis did his best to blot out Colette's terrible singing voice, but he was unable to blot out the "UWWAAAGH" she let out when her clumsiness inevitably got the best of her.

Not five minutes before the threesome left the Palmacosta docks and headed into the market area, Colette had crashed headfirst into some random, innocent person.

"Oh, come on!" Genis cried, throwing his fists into the air.

"Ow!" cried Colette's victim, a girl of a similar age with a voice twice as obnoxious as Colette's own. There was a loud crack as a bottle clattered to the ground and shattered into a million pieces. The girl stood up, adopting a frowny face that rivaled Colette's. The similarities between the two were a bit uncanny, or they would have been, had anyone been that observant (no one was because no one cared). Just then, as Genis' older sister was stirring out of her stupor, three other people – presumably the girl's goons – appeared on the scene, looking ready to fight.

"Hey!" Cried a boy on the broken-bottle-girl's left. "Watch where you're going, twerp!"

"'Twerp?'" Genis repeated, laughing, and the inner jerk in him came out to play. "Really? You practice that in front of the mirror? _Twerp?_ Are you still living in the nineties, you freak? I've heard better insults from sheep, which is kind of an insult to sheep because they have to be smarter than you, by the mere default of existing on the same plane."

"Why you little—"

" _Who can take the sunrise and sprinkle it with dew?"_ Colette sang, causing instant aneurysms for all of those who'd never grown immune to her voice before. Raine woke up immediately, springing up from the ground like it was a pop-up book. " _Cover it with chocolate and a miracle or two? The candy-maaa_ —"

"STOP!" One of the goons screamed, covering his ears. "Stop, PLEASE! Oh Goddess, no! You're killing us!"

"Yes, you're giving me a headache," Raine commented and thwacked Colette over the head with her pike-staff. Except she had no pike-staff, since Lloyd had taken it away from her while she was on the ship, so settled for slapping the blonde on the back of the head.

Colette whimpered. "I just wanted everyone to stop using their angry voices and thought singing would—"

She was barreled over before she could finish that sentence by a red and white blur, which, once it stopped being blurry, was revealed to be Lloyd. "I heard screaming and promises of violence!" He shouted, looking about frantically. "I want in on that action! What's going on? Who's killing who? Is it someone we hate? Oooh, I hope it is! Is it Desians? What?"

Genis sulked. "I hate my life."

"Mmm-ff-ph-mmm!"

"Oh, hi Colette! How'd you end up down there?" Lloyd glanced down at the pile of blonde Chosen beneath his feet and stepped off, helping his friend get up. "You always get yourself into the weirdest of places. You're such a klutz."

Colette opted not to reply, instead took a page out of Genis' book and sulked.

"Who the hell are you people?" One of the members from the new group had to ask. "And more importantly, when the hell are we going to start talking about the bottle your ditzy blonde just broke? And when are we getting to the blackmailing you into paying for a new one?"

Raine whacked him on the head. "Silence, child. Your reasoning is giving me a headache."

"Everything gives you a headache, Professor," Lloyd pointed out.

"Speaking of headaches, where is my staff?"

"Lloyd sold it for drugs while you were unconscious," Kratos reported, just now arriving on the scene. "And I thought I told you to stay put," he said to Lloyd, who had the decency to look guilty.

"I heard screaming and thought I was invited to the violence party," the dwarf-trained swordsman confessed, staring at his feet in shame. "It won't happen again. Oh sweet Martel, please don't kill me, I have so much Desian-killing to live for!"

Kratos appeared to seriously consider this. ". . . No promises."

"Well," the Professor sighed, "It could be worse. At least I now have a reason to buy a new one."

"What the hell is going _on_!" Shouted the same goon from earlier, earning him a harsher whap on the head from Raine.

"Excuse me," Lloyd said with a glare he'd picked up from Kratos, "but _we're_ in the middle of something. Talk about _rude._ "

The man, whom Genis was just now starting to note strangely resembled Lloyd if it weren't for the utterly ridiculous hair and shoddy armor, stomped around and raged at the insanity of the world. It was a common sight, in Sylvarant, to see people going mad in the streets, so no one acted surprised. "You crashed into us!" He cried. "We're the victims here! That chick broke our Palma Potion! Hell -oo? Does anybody care?"

They all looked amongst each other and said, in unison, "No." Except for Genis, who shuffled off to the side and muttered a bleak, 'whatever,' and Colette, who had shouted 'YES' by accident but corrected it under pressure from Lloyd and uttered a meek 'no'.

"Look," said the first girl, "all we want is that Palma Potion back—"

"It done broke," Lloyd interrupted, pointing at the shattered remains of said potion. "Unless you're like, a wizard and can fix it or something. With magic. But . . . it's pretty obvious you're not, with that doofy looking hat."

"—I'll let that comment about my sunhat slide; we'd really like a new one. I mean, it's only fair, you crashed into us."

"Hey, the way I see it," Genis spoke up, "you guys were the ones who crashed into Colette. It's not her fault she's so damn clumsy."

"Yeah," Lloyd agreed. "That's Frank's fault for dropping her on the head a jillion times when she was a baby."

"Yeah!" Colette nodded fiercely, fists balling into adorable rage.

"Isn't everything Frank's fault?" the Professor mused.

"See, the way _I_ remember it," Genis went on, "your Palma Potion was broken by the Goddess Martel when the agent of Her divine will, in a moment of infinite grace, granted you the privilege of colliding with her awesome presence. You should be thanking us for this holy opportunity."

"Thanks are preferred in the form of cash or Palma Potions," Lloyd added helpfully, "although marriage proposals are also acceptable."

Raine and Kratos exchanged equal looks of trepidation. "At what point did the adults lose control of this situation?" Kratos had to ask.

Raine blinked. "I'm not sure we ever had control in the first place. I'd be upset about it if I wasn't so gosh darn proud of Genis and Lloyd's blackmailing skills. Bravo, boys. Bravo."

"Thanks!" Lloyd preened, and Genis tried not to look happy at the first compliment he'd ever received.

Broken-bottle-girl fidgeted uncomfortably, not liking this turn of conversation one bit. "Um . . . please? We-we'd just like to put this whole incident behind us, and—"

"You want something from us? Get in line," Genis snorted. "Preferably before I set you on fire with my kendama."

"Scratch that," Raine corrected, patting her brother on the head fondly (which was a surreal experience for the latter), "make that _after._ You could use some target practice with your fire spells. I've been noticing that lately, you seem to hit Lloyd more often than the monsters."

"Hey, yeah," spoke the swordsman in question, coming to a realization. "What's up with that, man? That shit hurts!"

Genis pulled out his kendama and set a fireball on Lloyd, who ran around on fire for a few seconds before Kratos took pity and slapped him with a healing spell. "What are you talking about?" The young elf looked up at Raine, confused. "My aim is _perfect_."

"O-o-okay," said the girl that, by this point, everyone had forgotten about, our heroes included. They looked moderately surprised to see that these jerkoffs were still hanging around. "We're, um, just going to leave now—"

"But, the Palma Potion!" Objected the idiot on her left.

"Do you wanna get set on fire?" The girl hissed. "Forget the Palma Potion! Let's just jet, these guys are _really weird._ "

"I'm down with that idea," said the other guy, and the nondescript girl in the back nodded along.

"Fine, whatever," the idiot finally conceded. "But if we ever meet these losers again, they are _so_ getting it."

"Wow, you assholes are _still here?_ " Genis marveled.

And as one, the mysterious group of four turned tail and ran all the way out of Palmacosta like their houses were on magefire.

The Chosen Posse stood there for several seconds, thinking back on their exchange.

"Those guys were dicks," Lloyd announced, summing up everyone's feelings.

"I feel bad about the potion," Colette admitted, "but they were kind of mean. I wonder why they ran away like that, when we were only trying to help them?"

"Using the broadest definition of 'help', yes," Raine demurred, and then tapped her chin in thought. " _I_ only wonder what I could pay to get the last five minutes of my life back, and what I could do with all of that glorious free time."

"You're not the only one," Kratos intoned.

With that, the five headed off to the nearest Inn to bully their way into getting a room for free, since they were far too cheap to pay for stuff. A few sword-wavings and veiled threats later, they were secured a room and ready to spend a day in the Coastal City. After getting Raine a new staff, of course, which she promptly hit Lloyd over the head with to 'test its weight.'

"So what should we do first?" Colette asked.

Kratos, having a big head and knowing lots of important information, spoke first: "The Book of Regeneration is in the custody of the Church here in Palmacosta. Since it was the last record of the Chosen Spiritua, it may hold insight into our journey—"

"Hey Genis," Lloyd interrupted, since whatever Kratos was talking about was something he found utterly boring. "Wasn't there some big dumb academy you almost got sent to, but Raine got you kicked out of?"

"Ah yes," the Professor recalled, "the Palmacosta Academy. Genis was, regrettably, unable to attend."

"Buh-wha-I-because _you_ killed the headmaster in his sleep!" Genis roared, stomping in sudden storm of elfy rage.

She hit him. "The tuition fees were unacceptable for a schoolteacher in Iselia," Raine huffed. "He should've expected there to be a backlash . . . in the form of knife-to-the-spleen. Which, if one thinks about it, is entirely not my problem." The Professor paused for a few moments and smiled, looking off into the distance, lost in a fond memory.

Kratos waited for everyone to shut up before bringing the attention back to him. "We should go and get that Book of Regeneration. It could be vital to our quest. We might not be able to do the quest without it—"

"Let's go and visit that academy!" Lloyd cheered. "It'll be a mini-quest!"

"Hey, yeah!" Colette clapped her hands happily and giggled. "That could be fun! And then let's go sight-seeing for a few hours!"

"When did saving the world become secondary to the tourist industry?" Kratos asked no one and everyone.

"I hope the Academy doesn't expect an apology," Raine wondered, more to herself than anyone in particular. "Or recompense. I wonder if the old headmaster had any relatives. Should I apologize to them? Is it customary to submit an apology for wanton murder?"

"If it were, we would never have the time to accomplish anything," Kratos said simply. He didn't have the energy to drag the group all the way to the Church just to pick up a book that, with his luck, was missing or destroyed or handed off to a group of imposters. It wouldn't have surprised him in the least. At least the Academy could prove to be a decent distraction from planning the murders of all his comrades.

Before they could waste time at the Academy, however, they stopped off at a local shop to replenish their gel supply since Kratos knew that both statistics and common sense indicated they were be in sore need of gels by the end of the day. The shop was nothing impressive, with a dingy sign indicating it as _Marble's Gel and Lingerie Emporium_.

What was mildly interesting was the sight of a teenage clerk telling off two Desians.

"Oh, _please!_ " the girl guffawed, re-defining the word 'annoying.' "No one would ever sell gels for that low of a price, especially to a bunch of rotten Desians! I'll never sell _anything_ to the likes of you!"

"Don't you get uppity with me, missy!" One of the Desians barked, and Kratos had to physically restrain Lloyd at this point from straight up murdering the two soldiers. "You'll sell those to me and you'll sell them right goddamn now!"

"You're not my _mom!_ You don't get to order _me!_ " The girl sneered.

"Chocolat, **stop** ," a woman who was clearly 'Chocolat's mother ordered.

"Buh-but mom, these Desians are being super big meanie-heads!" She insisted, her voice reaching into decibels that should be forbidden in civilized countries. "And these are the dudes who took grandma away!"

"I've told you a thousand times," sighed the second Desian, who was amazingly reasonable for some unfathomable reason, "you paranoid little twit, I have no idea who your grandma even is. There are _thousands_ of Desians and more than a few Ranches. If your grandma's at one of them, it isn't my problem. It's just our business to terrorize you, it's nothing personal. Don't be such a baby about it. Now could you _please_ sell us these gels?"

"Ah, screw this," scoffed the first Desian and made for the door. "I don't need this kind of crap today. Stupid filthy humans and their filthy human mud-towns make me sick. I tell ya, George, they're all the same."

George, the second Desian, sighed a second time and trailed after his buddy. "Okay, but if we don't get those gels, Magnius is gonna be pissed, and I'm blaming you for it."

"We'll just steal some from some creeps on the road – Lord Magnius won't know the difference . . ." by then, the two Desians had reached out of earshot. Kratos finally released Lloyd, who had stopped struggling and gave the mercenary a dark look.

"Whaddya do that for?" Lloyd whined. "I was gonna kill them!"

"Precisely."

" . . . You never make any sense, Kratos. You're a weird guy."

"Maybe I am."

"More to the point," spoke the older woman from before (Chocolat's mother, remember) – "I am Cacao, the owner of this fine establishment since my mother 'passed away.' I am sorry you had to witness that exchange. My daughter, you see, is very retarded."

Chocolat yawned. "Whatever, mom. I'm going to work. Bye!" The chocolate-haired Chocolat marched right out of the door, but not before hitting her head on the doorframe on the way out in a very stupid manner, confirming Cacao's assessment of her daughter's mental health for all those present. "Buhhh," she blubbered and then stumbled off to wherever her next job was.

"We are not unused to dealing with the mentally challenged," the Professor assured Cacao. "To wit." She pointed at Colette, who had fallen over in a fit of clumsiness and was babbling about singing shrubbery.

Cacao looked a little distressed, but politely said nothing. "I see. Thank you for your patience."

"What was that about, anyway?" Genis wondered, ambling up to the counter. "Desians walk around here unmolested?"

Lloyd gasped, looking revolted. "Why would _anyone_ wanna molest a Desian? That is _**gross**_ , Genis! They're evil BDSM half-elven freak-os!"

"Yeah!" Colette agreed, stumbling back to her feet.

Genis stared at his two 'friends' for a long moment, and then looked back to Cacao. "Well?"

Cacao shrugged. "Palmacosta signed a peace treaty a while back with the Desians. Provided our citizens stay within the city limits, the Desians do not molest us."

" _MOLESTING?_ _ **That is so GROSS! PEDOPHILIA! NECROPHILIA! I NEED AN ADULT!**_ " Lloyd fell over with a sickening clunk when Kratos donkey-punched him.

Raine looked at the mercenary questioningly. "I . . . felt it was the responsible thing to do," Kratos explained.

Cacao continued as if nothing odd at all had occurred: "I'm certain someone in the Governor-General's office could tell you more about it than I. Now, what can I say to convince you to buy something here today?"

After the group had purchased several gels, it was determined that investigating/sabotaging the Desian Treaty, the Book of Replenishiniationmathing (whose name no one could be pressed to remember), and saving the world could be put off for a few hours while they all went to see the Academy that Raine had gotten Genis kicked out of.

As soon as Lloyd entered the building, an alarm went off in his brain that sensed he had just entered a place of academic learning, prompting him to yawn. "This place is _boring,_ " he whined. "So lame. Let's get out of here."

"You were the one who wanted to come here," Kratos reminded him.

"Oh hey, look, food!" Lloyd cried, totally ignoring him, and took off to the cafeteria.

Genis observed his surroundings with a dull, disinterested expression. The building wasn't really that impressive, looking more like a glorified bed and breakfast than a prominent schoolhouse; then again, Sylvarant's building standards weren't up to, well, standard. "I hate to be the one to say this, but I agree with Lloyd. This place _is_ kind of boring. I know that I was accepted and everything, but—"

"Chh- _you_ were accepted?" A random glasses-wearing boy shrieked. "As if! Only those with an IQ over one-hundred-thirty-two are able to attend this school! The best of the best, the intelligent of the intelligent!"

Genis snorted. "Then how'd _you_ get in?"

"Excellent come-back," Raine applauded. Genis gave her a weird look, and she only shrugged. "I'm in a good mood today, little brother. What can I say? Young man, answer Genis' question. He has a valid point. How is it that a little lowlife like you was accepted into this academy?"

" _I_ was given a _scholarship_ ," the nerd boasted. "I certainly didn't fail six times due to a borderline sociopathic personality disorder, and then get plastic surgery so I could look exactly like this guy I didn't like, kill him, and then take his place in the Academy." The nerd coughed lightly. "And _I_ refuse to believe that someone as puny and creepy as _this_ little puny creeper was offered a position at _my_ illustrious school."

" _Your_ school? I didn't see your name on it, Mensa!" The young elf shouted.

"I assure you," Raine said coolly, "my little brother was offered attendance at Palmacosta Academy. He was denied due to . . . criminal association, despite having plausible deniability, which has nothing to do with his intelligence or his height, and all to do with _nothing_. I take no responsibility for any of those things and am prepared to tirelessly argue that in court. Furthermore, I believe Kratos was the one who killed those people, because I was in, er, Hima at the time. Yes, Hima." She pointed at the purple-clad mercenary, who had not even been paying attention to the conversation, and looked vaguely surprised by all the eyes suddenly on him.

The nerd looked confused. "Killed . . . _what?_ I don't even know what you're talking uh . . . okay, whatever, I'm going to go study for my calculus exam." He promptly left, dashing up the stairs as fast as he possibly could so as to get away from the crazy people.

"Yeah, you do that, twerp," Genis muttered.

"I wonder why that boy ran away so fast?" Colette wondered innocently. "People seem to run away from us a lot. Do we smell funny?" She sniffed her armpit experimentally.

"Yes," Raine insisted, a manic look coming to her eyes. "Or more specifically, _you_ smell funny, Colette. There is no reason at all for people to run away from us, because we are all so terribly innocent."

"Yes," Kratos murmured, "terribly."

"And we do not indiscriminately murder people because of outrageous tuition fees. That is absolutely not a thing we do, or have ever done at a time in the past. Why is it so hot in here? If you'll excuse me, I'm going to find that darn scamp, Lloyd." With that not-at-all-panicky-or-guilty comment, the Professor took off like the wind towards the cafeteria.

After a few moments of silence, Colette clapped and giggled inanely. "We're heroes!" She cheered.

"I forgot what we were supposed to be doing in here," Genis confessed to no one in particular, "or why we even came here to Palmacosta in the first place. But damn if I'm not hungry."

"Let us adjourn to the cafeteria," Kratos the Scary offered.

And they did.

An hour and several delicious sandwiches later, they all finally remembered that they were supposed to be regenerating the world, and Kratos quietly suggested they go find the Book of Regeneration (there may or may not have been a vein throbbing in his forehead at the time). Off the group went to the Church of Martel, but along the way, they were waylaid by a miserable sight:

"Mister Governal Genero Man Sir!" A small, adorable little boy whined. His eyes were like puppy eyes, his manner like a forlorn puppy, and his facial expression like the expression you'd see on a puppy's face while you punted it off an overpass. He appeared to be in the process of guilt-tripping a man in a skirt, who was the Governor-General of Palmacosta. "My daddy was taken to the Ranch and now I'm nothing but a poor, downtrodden urchin! The streets are very cold at night and I have no place to go. Won't you bring my daddy back? Or at the very least give me some money? Pweeeease?"

A small, adorable little blonde girl with perky pigtails smiled in a sympathetic, simpering way. "Don't worry," she gushed, "my mother died of an illness! Daddy will help you!"

" . . . That has nothing to do with anything," the boy snapped, the lovable-urchin façade evaporating. "You could've said 'walk left purple light bulb' and it would've had the same relevance as the thing you just said. My dad is being tortured in a Ranch and will probably die, I have no childhood, and I've been living off of shower mold. It's been months since I've had real food. I am, quite possibly, the most pathetic person alive and I will probably die in a Desian invasion that will take place at an indeterminate point in the future. How can you possibly sympathize with me, you who want for nothing, who have never known fear or hunger?"

The girl drew back, shocked, and tears came to her adorable eyes. "DADDY!" She shrieked, hiding behind the skirts of a man in a robe. I mean dress. He looked important. He frowned at the little boy.

"Now, now," the apparent Governor-General chastised, "there's no call for rudeness. Manners are free, so there's no reason you can't afford them, but just in case they aren't here's some money." He threw coins at the little boy's face and stalked off, with his cute little daughter trailing after him. "Come, Kilia, let us away this festering marketplace!" he called, and the little girl giggled. All the while the urchin scrounged up every last bit of coin that had been flung in his face like a greedy Jew.

The Chosen Posse watched the little boy scrounge in silence. When he finally noticed them, he looked a little startled. "What are you loser jerks lookin' at?" He snapped, the urchin façade falling completely. In his place was a peculiar little midget, or possibly a gnome. No one was sure, but he _definitely_ wasn't a poor little child. "Pfft! Acting like you ain't never seen a midget before? Huh? You wanna piece of me? Fuck off!" And then the mysterious midget kicked Lloyd in the shin and ran away, never to be seen again.

"What the actual fuck? Ah, my leg!" Lloyd cried, clutching his leg in pain.

"That was weird," Genis commented, silently happy at Lloyd's cries of pain.

Lloyd grumbled, massaging his battle wound. "Tch. If someone told me earlier today that I'd be knee-capped by a midget dressed up as an urchin as part of a scam to get money from the governor, I woulda slapped them in the face and said, 'you shut the hell up when you're talking to me, Lindsay Lohan. You're a drunk bitch.'"

Raine slapped him on the head, and the sworder whimpered like a baby. "I won't even ask who this 'Lindsay Lohan' is, but be quiet. It was barely a scratch. Get over yourself. Besides, I have a feeling that this exchange will have been important at some point in the future," she announced dramatically. Then she frowned. "Or perhaps I have indigestion from the Philly I ate earlier. I can't tell. Regardless, we should continue to the Church, to secure the Book of Regeneration."

"Onwards, to victory!" Colette cried and marched on, waving an invisible flag in front of her. They all stared after the Chosen, and with the exception of Lloyd each wondered whether or not it was really worth it to follow her or just wander off and pretend they had never been to Iselia, let alone heard of this 'Chosen One.' Lloyd just rubbed his shin and sulked about violent shin-capping midgets.

"Show of hands, who here is surprised by this?"

Only Colette's hand went up. "Present!" She cried.

Lloyd pulled her hand back down. "No, Colette, we're _not_ in class, remember?"

"Oh." She scratched her head and started humming a song under her breath, something about brown paper packages tied up with strings.

They had made the incredibly perilous trek to Palmacosta's chapel, whereupon they discovered that the Book of Regeneration was no longer even there. It had been 'given away' to the governor. Needless to say, they were all upset by this turn of events, since no one wanted to visit Governor-General Dorr after what they'd witnessed with the midget-urchin in the plaza.

"We're terribly sorry for the inconvenience, Chosen One," the pastor groveled. He got down on his knees and began to sob for forgiveness.

"Oh, that's okay!" Colette gushed. "It's just more adventure for us!"

"And now we have to walk all the way to that building and deal with that weird guy in the dress," Lloyd groaned. "I have had my _fill_ of men in dresses."

"Yeah, it's starting to irritate me too," Genis agreed.

"Everyone is irritated by it at this rate," Raine announced. She leaned on her brand new staff and sighed plaintively. "And yet I can't shake the feeling that, down the road, more irritation awaits us."

"As long as there's no dress wearing men, or shin-kicking midgets," said Lloyd darkly. He cracked his knuckles, fantasizing about punting the next midget he saw off a cliff.

With that remark, the posse left the Church and took off to the biggest, most official looking building in Palmacosta. They braced themselves and headed on in.

After one set of double doors, they were greeted by an ovular table, the robed form of the Governor-General, the adorable little blonde girl from before with the excessively irritating voice, and the most ridiculous handsome man anyone had ever seen, ever.

Colette trotted up the steps, jumping the last two and skidding to a halt. With a wide grin plastered on her face, she waved and chirped, "hi there!"

As was well-known at this point, Lloyd didn't like people other than him taking charge of situations. He knocked Colette over and snapped, "my turn! Anyway, whazzup, home skillets?" He dropped a gangster sign to the ridiculously handsome guy, who paled in fear.

"Security!" He shrieked, scrambling for cover. Lloyd frowned in confusion.

"I _am_ the security," Kratos said from the spot he was leaning on the back wall. "Don't be alarmed, we won't be taking up much of your time."

"We're here for the Book of Regeneration, Governor-General," the Professor stated. She stepped up and shoved Lloyd to the side, who shoved into Genis, who shoved into Colette, who toppled over like a brick. A pretty brick.

"Why on earth would you want the Book of Regeneration? Are you terrorists? Trying to sabotage the journey of regeneration?" Dorr snapped in furious paranoia, his nostrils flaring.

"Yes," Genis said, just as Raine said at the same time, "No," and Kratos uttered, "No, but close." The three intelligent members of the group shared a look with each other, before Raine spoke up for all of them. "We're, er, _companions_ of the Chosen One." She coughed lightly and muttered under her breath, "I came up with that on the spot, that was pretty good, right?"

"Good enough," Genis murmured back.

"Anyway," Raine continued, "that blonde idiot – I mean blonde dolt – I mean girl, over yonder, is the Chosen One. She received the Oracle and got a snazzy ruby necklace out of it. We need the Book to save the world."

"And to pick up chicks," Lloyd tacked on, smirking. "Chicks _love_ saviors."

"Do they?" The ridiculously handsome man perked up from his hiding place under the big table.

"Oh yeah, totally," Lloyd gabbed. "After this journey is over, I'm gonna get _mad_ game."

Genis rolled his eyes and snorted. "Whatever, Lloyd. The only game you've gotten so far is from that big-boobed assassin who keeps trying to kill us, and if you ask me, that's just sad."

Lloyd punched his elven buddy in the face, giving the kid a bloody nose. "Nobody _did_ ask you! Shut up, Genis."

"So, you're the _Chosen_ , eh?" Dorr leered, peering at the blonde idiot – I mean _girl_ on the floor.

Colette sat up and waved happily. "Oh, hi! People are looking at me! I love it when they do that. Tee hee!"

Dorr snorted derisively. He threw his head back and shrieked, "SIC 'EM, BOYS!" At that, over forty guards crawled literally out of the woodwork and crowded the group, pointing a spear at each and every one of their throats. Lloyd whistled at the speed of the Palmacosta Army's response unit while Genis and Raine covered their elven ears, alarmed by all of the clanking noises from the heavy armor. Colette bled from her ears, due to her Super Angel Hearing™. Kratos looked as nonchalant as a nonchalant person can be, when a sharp spear is pressed to their Adam's apple.

"What's the meaning of this?" Raine cried.

"Oh, hi more people!" Colette waved, oblivious to the danger.

"IMPOSTERS!" Dorr shrieked, pointing a shaking finger at the group. Neil, the ridiculously handsome man, cowered beneath the desk once more. "The Chosen's group just came through here and already took the Book!"

"God _damn_ it!" Kratos snapped. He hated being right.

"Math and Darwin!" Genis swore. "Why is everyone in the world incompetent except for us?" he asked no one, and no one responded (duh).

Colette had attempted to stand up again, but failed somehow. How one fails to stand up is a mystery, much like how one fails to make a sandwich, but Colette managed, and her failure was nothing short of spectacular. She crashed into the guards in front of her and, in a fit of clumsiness, lost control over her angelic abilities and sprouted her big pink sparkly wings, exposing her nature to the whole world.

Everyone was sufficiently dazzled by Colette's sparkly pink display. Neil put his cowardice aside and crawled out from under the table to gawk. Dorr was hypnotized. His little child looked like the shadow centurion that ate the Aska – for a less obscure metaphor, she looked like Christmas had come in July. Dazed but excited, she pointed at Colette's wings and jumped up and down like a very annoying, insipid monkey with an irritating voice. "Look! Look!" She cried out in her excessively high-pitched, annoying voice. "Look, Daddy! It's an _aaaaangel!_ Her wings are sooo pretty! I want, I want!"

"Yes, yes, Kilia," Dorr murmured, staring at Colette with renewed interest and, if possible, even _more_ paranoia. "Clearly, this girl is the Chosen One."

"I am?" Colette cocked her head to the side and grinned a big, goofy grin. "Yay!"

"Hey, is it just me," Genis murmured to his buddy Lloyd, "or does Colette seem more stupider than usual today?"

Lloyd shrugged. "Well, she couldn't have gotten worse. That's not possible. Maybe she's just distracted?"

"I don't think she has enough in her to _be_ distracted . . ."

"Ooh! Look! A puppy! Come here, puppy! Tee hee!"

" . . . but I've been wrong before."

Raine tapped her staff on the floor to bring everyone to attention. "Now that we've gotten that garbage out of the way, where's our Book of Regeneration?"

Dorr rubbed the back of his head in a very Lloyd-like manner. "Er, yes, about that. We, uh, Neil, handle the angry lady."

The stupidly handsome man cleared his throat. "We may or may not have given the Book of Regeneration away to a group of imposters."

Everyone stared at him in blank horror. "What," Raine said, though it was less of a question and more an expression of rage. Her face began to tighten and steam began to come out of her ears . . . although that could've been everyone's crazy imaginations.

"I don't know what they're so upset about," Kratos muttered to himself, stewing in his own frustration. "This is but par for the course, for us."

"Kratos, are you muttering to yourself again?" Lloyd asked. "That's a sign of madness, dude."

Kratos stared at Lloyd, feeling exhausted and infuriated all at once. "Yes. Clearly _I_ am the one who is mad."

"Crazy Kratos. Whatever."

"I CANNOT BELIEVE THIS!" Genis suddenly shrieked, shaking his arms wildly and screaming at the ceiling in tiny, elven fury. "Are you humans all this hopelessly incompetent? Do you use your eyes for _anything_ or are they just there for decoration? God _fucking_ damn it! It shouldn't be this way! Lloyd's blind hatred of all things Desian, his inexplicable talent for killing Desians, and utter hatred of betrayal shouldn't be the only things keeping from me joining the evil organization that oppresses our world! You humans _almost_ deserve what you have coming. _Almost._ I hate this planet, I hate you, I _definitely_ hate you—" he pointed specifically at Neil, who looked hurt and confused, "and I fucking. HATE. al—"

A loud crack resounded throughout the room as Raine's staff came crashing down on Genis' fragile skull. He fell to the floor with a thud, unconscious. Raine frowned at her handiwork. "He better not have a concussion," she huffed. "If he did, it was his own fault. Anyway, Genis' excessive whining aside, he did have some valid points. Didn't you bother to check whether or not Colette's imposter had a Cruxis Crystal, which would verify that she is, indeed, the Chosen One?"

Neil and Dorr shared at long look with each other and then shrugged. "Naw," Dorr explained.

"Well, this was an utter waste of time, then," Raine summarized. "Palmacosta is officially the most pointless stop on the map ever. We shall simply have to hunt these imposters down and kill them brutally. I mean, er, bring them to justice." She coughed, and then winked at Kratos, who took the hint. He _always_ did the killing. It was one of the benefits of being comrades with an unscrupulous mercenary. "Come along, children!" She called and headed out the door, leaving a the annoying girl, the handsome guy, and the dress-wearing lunatic behind. "Lloyd, drag Genis out of here."

With Genis in tow behind Lloyd and Kratos, who didn't trust the Chosen to walk without running into anything, carrying the Chosen over his shoulder, they headed straight out of Palmacosta and marched into the unknown.

Except that as they left the city . . . something strange happened inside of Lloyd's thinky-head. _Huh_ , he thought. _I wonder what this is?_ And suddenly, it happened. "Oh! Oh! Oh!" He dropped Genis on the ground and started hopping in one place. "Um, um, guys!"

"What?" Kratos snapped, giving Lloyd the third degree of the glare. Lloyd shrunk back and whimpered, but had gotten so used to the glares at this point that he quickly recovered.

"I have an **idea!** "

"N-wh-h-how?" Raine stated, stunned in her disbelief. Lloyd? Ideas? Could such a thing be true!

Lloyd grinned like the mad sworder he was. "Yeah! Yeah, I just remembered those assholes we met earlier, you know the ones, right?"

The two adults attempted to think back. "Are you referring to the midget dressed up as a child who assaulted you, or the ones who harassed us at the Academy?"

Raine sniffed, feeling defensive. "What a waste of time. Let us never speak of that school again! Ever."

Lloyd shook his head. "No, no, the assholes from _before_."

They tried to think back even more, and then Raine suddenly 'aha'd. "Ah, the ones who made the poor and half-assed attempt at blackmailing us, and then ran away in terror halfway through? The ones with the Palma Potion?"

"Yeah, those guys. They said they were headed towards some peak or something, I think. It's hard to remember." Lloyd scratched his head, trying to force the thoughts to come to his poor, malnourished brain. "Anyway, I was thinking – what if those guys were the imposters?"

They deferred to Kratos, who had taken place as the unofficial leader of their group. He mulled it over, shifting the Chosen to the other shoulder while she rambled on about fields of gold. "It's possible," he conceded. "What isn't possible is how little I care."

Raine frowned, tapping her pale chin. "Lloyd, do you remember where exactly they said they were going?"

The sworder thought back, desperate to get the cogs and gears rolling in his head, but it was to no avail. "Erm, I think it was a place called Twin Peaks. Aaaaand something about a guy named Briggs? Or was it Miggs? Oh, no, wait! I know! It was Dante's Peak."

"No, it wasn't," Kratos stated needlessly, because he knew deep down inside that no one would pay attention to him.

"Where is that, exactly?" Raine asked.

Lloyd shrugged. "Dunno, but they said—"

"No they did not," Kratos interjected.

"—yes they did, Kratos, I remember," Lloyd went on, "I have an _excellent_ memory. And they said there was gonna be a volcano exploding soon, so they were headed there to, um, evacuate people. Yeah."

"That's ridiculous," Raine stated. Kratos let hope sprout within his chest for a brief moment, before Raine axed it down once more. "There are no volcanoes in Sylvarant that I've heard of, and I would've heard of them. I'm quite well-educated about Sylvarant's landscape, Lloyd."

"Well that's what they said!" he defended, bending down to snatch the unconscious Genis' feet so he could continue dragging the little elf behind them.

"Well it's clear to me that **they** were misinformed. Or entirely stupid. Or lying to us. Or all of the above. What's more clear to me than that is that I don't care, I just want out of this miserable city."

"I agree," Kratos concurred. "We can still continue without the Book of Regeneration, although it will take us some time." They headed off out of Palmacosta, strolling out of the city gates without a single regret in their hearts. The Coastal City was definitely not all it lived up to be.

Lloyd thought about what the two adults of their posse had said, and then nodded. "That makes sense. The Book probably would've just burned up in the volcano anyway. Pages are kinda flammable."

 _Smack!_ "There _is **no** peak!_ "

"Then why did they say they were going to it, Professor, huh? Explain _that_ with your logic and your magic! Explain _that_ to me!"

_Double-smack!_

"I am going to kill every last one of them."

"What are you muttering about, Kratos?"

"Nothing."

"Tch. Crazy Kratos."

_Yes. Clearly I am mad, and the world has gone mad with me._


End file.
